Learning Base 10 is an important concept for the development of key math skills such as place value, borrowing, regrouping, and more. While we highly recommend getting your hands on a solid set of Base 10 blocks, you can also make a useful set at home with a few items you might have lying around anyway!
Materials:
- Popsicle Sticks (Jumbo size if you have them)
- Dried Beans (Pinto or Lima work well. Elbow macaroni or stickers would work here too. )
- Glue (liquid, not a glue stick)
Once you’ve decided on the materials you’re going to use for your homemade Base 10 blocks, then you can assemble them super quick! Simply glue ten beans on each popsicle stick. Leave a little space between the beans to make it easier to count the beans.
Once you make ten sticks you might consider gluing them together to make 100. Then you’ll have a 100 block for students to visually see the individual sticks of ten. You could glue some blank sticks to the back in order to connect them if desired. The single beans will count as the “ones.”
Printable Base 10 Blocks
If you’d rather just print some Base 10 blocks you can do that too! File Folder Fun has some FREE Base 10 printables you can use to create hundreds, tens, and ones. We recommend printing the Base 10 Template on differently colored card stock paper for best results.
Interactive Math Curriculum
Interactive Math Notebook for Kindergarten
This comprehensive kindergarten math curriculum provides you with a full year of hands-on math lessons, games and activities. This complete set includes an interactive daily warm-up folder and optional printable math manipulatives. Covering 4 days/Week over 36-weeks, students complete a daily worksheet alongside a daily game or interactive activity. Designed to keep students engaged while keeping the prep-work to a minimum this set coordinates perfectly with our R.E.A.D. Curriculum Notebook.
