My kids came in screaming from outside the other day in fear of…a rabid dog? A rattlesnake? Nope. A honeybee. As the weather heats up (more some places than others), hopefully your kiddos are enjoying those bikes and balls that have been put up for the winter. Cleaning out the garage and dusting off my flip flops has inspired me to replace those single digit addition and subtraction worksheets with some Bee Math Activities for Kids.
The bee-themed packet includes printables that can be laminated and used again with a dry/wet erase marker. Early childhood learners can practice addition and subtraction facts on the honeycomb pages.
Take out your rulers for measuring the width and perimeter of hexagons, or get young brains buzzing with bee themed word problems. Also included are sweet-as-honey pattern activities to practice completing patterns.
As the school year starts to wrap-up, it typically sets educators on a race to complete two major tasks: Reach year-end curriculum goals and review, review, review.
You want to make sure your students are ready to tackle the next school year with knowledge and skills that are becoming ingrained in their spongy little brains.
Bee Math Activities for Kids can help you accomplish that by engaging young learners with something other than single digit addition worksheets.
Reviewing skills in the Springtime not only allows you to check for understanding in your early childhood learners, it can also provide valuable insight into your teaching methods for next school year.
How to Use Bee Math Activities
Simply print the math worksheets. Then, you can either laminate them for durability and reuse or not. You can present the whole packet as a year-in-review OR you can focus on one page at a time. You could even use the Bee Math activities to introduce skills coming next year just to build some background knowledge.
The Hexagon Math single digit addition and subtraction problems are a great way to review sums/differences as students complete each piece of the honeycomb to determine what the common sum/difference is.
The measurement page includes hexagons for children to measure using centimeters. Follow up with an explanation of how we find the perimeter of shapes to really get their brains buzzing!
Use the word problems as a jumping off point for instruction on the types of keywords we look for in story problems, or how we determine if we need to add or subtract.
Use the honey bee patterns sheet to check for progress with patterning skills by completing the missing pictures to complete the patterns. Students could also cut out their own pictures to work on fine motor skills.
Bee Math Activities for Kids is a versatile math resource. You might try:
- Use the number addition/subtraction pages as an addition drill as you time students to see how fast they can fill up the honeycomb hexagons with sums/differences
- Provide hands-on manipulatives and number lines/charts for students that need help adding and subtracting
- Create a math center with laminated pages and plenty of resources, like number lines and charts, rulers, pattern examples and manipulatives
- Practice word problems, then have students make up their own bee themed stories
- Measure with rulers, then break out non-traditional units like paper clips, rubber bands or even something small from the pantry (rice, beans, noodles)
- Spend a day on each topic as a review and use the appropriate practice sheet to check for understanding
- Practice number recognition for those that aren’t quite ready for adding and subtracting
- Use the pattern pictures to encourage students to make their own patterns and challenge a friend to fill in the missing piece
- Use the entire packet to complement a Science unit on honeybees/insects
Our Favorite Bee Books:
We can’t live without these!
Once your child’s creativity is sparked with this fun activity, take it a step further with these engaging resources:
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The Bee BookThe Life and Times of the HoneybeeBee: A Peek-Through Picture BookExplore My World: Honey BeesThe Magic School Bus Inside a BeehiveWhat If There Were No Bees?: A Book About the Grassland Ecosystem (Food Chain Reactions)National Geographic Readers: BeesBeehive (Happy Fox Books) One-of-a-Kind Board Book Teaches Kids Ages 2 to 5 about Bees, Flying into a Hive with Every Turn of the Page, plus Educational Facts, Vocabulary Words, and More (Peek Inside)National Geographic Readers: Buzz, Bee!