Patterning Musical Chairs!

Posted Originally on January 18, 2012

This week we are focusing on patterns in math. We are going over repeating patterns and growing patterns. Yesterday we played a SUPER fun and engaging game! It is called Patterning Musical Chairs.

So this is how you play!

First you pass out manipulatives to your students to use to create a pattern on their desk. Each student creates only 3 units of their pattern. You can either have them make a repeating pattern or a growing pattern. We just did repeating patterns on this particular day.
 The extra manipulatives stay in the middle of the table for the game.  Then you play music as students travel around the room. (my kids danced to kidbop :)) When you stop the music, each student rushes to find a desk. When they sit down they must figure out the pattern at that desk and then add 1 more unit onto the pattern.  You can do as many rounds as you think you can. We did about 4 or 5 rounds. At the end they return to their original desk. They check their own pattern to see if it was correct. 

The kids LOOOVED it! A couple of them kept saying, "You're supposed to take away a chair!" I just said that this was a different kind of musical chairs and we wanted everyone to be able to add on to a pattern each time. 

This is such a great way to get all of the students involved and engaged!  

Here are some pics of my class enjoying the game!