4 Ways to Use Boom Cards for FREE in Your Upper Elementary Classroom

So you’ve just purchased your first set of Boom Cards. You go to use them when all of a sudden, BOOM! You realize you have to pay for a subscription! Sound familiar? 

As teachers, we often end up paying for a lot of things out of our own pocket, just to help better our students’ education. But I get it. There are bills to pay, people to feed, and life to live. Purchasing another subscription was probably the last thing you wanted to do. After all, you’ve worked hard for your money!

I love using Boom Cards in my classroom. If you are able to purchase the subscription I definitely recommend it, but if it just isn’t for you, don’t worry. You can still use the Boom cards you’ve purchased in a meaningful way in your classroom without having to spend more of your hard-earned money.

Here are 4 ways to use Boom Cards for free:

1. Use Them as a Whole Group

Boom cards are great for whole group instruction and practice. With the free account, you still have access to any decks you have purchased. Throw the Boom cards up on your SmartBoard or Promethean Board, and solve them as a class. I’ve had my students get out whiteboards, and answer math problems on their whiteboards. Then, they show me their answers and I am able to easily assess where they are. I can easily address any misconceptions, or extend their thinking. Plus, students love being able quickly see if their answer was correct or not.

2. Use Them for Tier 2 Instruction

As long as you have some device that connects to the internet (like a laptop, an iPad or a Kindle) you can pull the Boom cards up while you are working in a small group. You can use the same sort of procedure that you do with the whole class. Have your students answer the questions on a whiteboard or a piece of paper, and then you can address those misconceptions in a small group. Boom cards are great for targeting one specific skill that you need students to work on. This is always great during tier 2 intervention.

3. Use Them in a Center 

If you have access to a SmartBoard or a Promethean board, you can put these up and turn them into a math center. You can easily see what your students are working on, while using the Boom cards on their own. This is a great way to solidify their understanding of different concepts. Have your students write down their answers on a piece of paper, and then turn the answers in to you. This allows you to still check for understanding, even if they don’t have their own account.

4. Utilize the Fast Pin

Boom Learning does have a free option that you can utilize with your students called a fast pin. If you want to assign your students to each work on the same deck, you will create what is called a fast pin. You give the students the Boom website and the fast pin, and they can log in and work on it on their own without any subscription required from you. The only downside to this is that you will not see the reports on how your students are doing. However, this is great if you need something quick and easy for your students to work on. 

This is also a wonderful option for sub plans. Your students can still get the practice in for whatever specific skills you want them to practice while you’re gone, and you don’t have to copy off piles of worksheets. And if you’re like me when writing sub plans, the less time you can spend in the copy room, the better. Want to know exactly how to get the Fast Pin? Check out the video below and I’ll walk you through it!

If you are able to purchase a Boom cards subscription, I would highly recommend it. I love getting reports about how my students are doing on various decks, and I can easily assign different decks to different students. However, if it just isn’t in the cards for you, that’s okay! You can still get a lot of value out of using Boom cards for free.

And if you’ve never tried Boom cards, I’ve got a free deck you can try out on comparing multi-digit numbers. Click here to sign up, and I’ll email it right to you! Let me know how you use Boom Cards in your classroom!

Happy Teaching!