Bottle Top Games for the Classroom!

I love to have activities for centers that are simple to set up, simple to make and of course educational! I started collecting bottle tops from water, soda, juice, milk...pretty much anything that had a top! I have become bottle top crazy actually, I look everywhere for bottle tops and have even gone through the recycle bin at my grandparents house for these tops! I have my family and my boyfriends family now all collecting them for me too! I have found a convenient way to store the tops while I'm waiting to get enough to create the game. Once I get a top I wash it and then place it in the baggy on the fridge! 
Once I get about 60-65 tops I create the game! I use the stickers that are used at yard sales to write the questions on. The question is on the on the top of the cap and the answer is on the inside of the cap. I use the three different colors as different point levels. The green are 1 point, yellow 2 points and pink 3 points. I like doing this because my students are older and love to be competitive. This game also allows the students to select questions that they want to solve, they can choose "easier" ones if they are still struggling with the skill or they can choose more "challenging" ones for the higher points. Either way the students should have fun and feel confident while playing and learning! 
This set of bottle top games are multi-digit multiplication. I created another one that is in a different pencil box that was basic multiplication. I am collecting more tops right now to create division questions. Eventually I'd like to have some for simplifying fractions, adding fractions...the possibilities are endless and it is so easy and CHEAP to make!!! I hold the tops in pencils boxes from Target, they are only 99 cents, I store them in my classroom for easy access!!! 

Directions to play!
Students will take out all the tops and spread them out top side up!
Taking turns, a student will pick a top that they would like to solve, if they get it correct they keep the top and write down the points earned from the top.
If a student gets the question wrong they have to put the top back.
At the end of center time, the students add up their points and find the winner!

You can either have the students check each others work to make sure the person got their question right, or you could have the center leader in charge of a calculator to check their answer. 

Hope you get some good ideas from this and are able to make it work in your classroom!! It really is so easy and fun AND a money saver! 

I Love Task Cards!

I LOVE Task Cards! I use them in my centers all the time to either practice skills or review skills! They are wonderful to have on hand for students that finish work early and need extra practice, or for tutoring! I will even put them under my projector and solve them as a class on teams and make a game using them! They are just WONDERFUL and my students LOVE them too!

I finally finished a set of task cards I've been working on for Operations and Algebraic Thinking (4.OA.1-4.OA.5)! During my summer off I'm making items for my students to use in the classroom and I'm adding them to my Teachers Pay Teachers Store to share with others too! I teach 4th grade math so these task cards are obviously for 4th grade! I hope to to make a set of 20 task cards to go with each strand in math! I would love to eventually make some for each strand for other grades. Since I'm just getting started with my TpT store and blogging, I'm going to work on 4th grade first, might be a while before I get to the other grades! Here is what I've made so far! Click on the pictures to share on Pinterest and check them out at my store! I printed all 100 task cards out and had my boyfriend help me cut them, glue them on card stock and and laminate them! They are BEAUTIFUL! I can't WAIT to use them through out the year!

Here are 20 task cards for each strand 4.OA.1 to 4.OA.5! I created a worksheet version with the same questions as the task cards so you can choose how you want the students to review this skill. Included in this product are answer keys and a recording sheet for the students task cards. Also in this document are black and white copies for those that like to save their ink!


4.OA.1- Write multiplication equations and create multiplication word problems.


4.OA.2.- Multiply & divide word problems to solve for the unknown


4.OA.3.- Solve multi-step word problems that involve adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing. 


4.OA.4- Identify the numbers 1-100 as prime or composite and list all factors

4.OA.5- Generate number and shape patterns, state the rule and find relationships among numbers.

Or purchase ALL 5 sets above in one set!!! Buy 3 get 2 FREE!!! It has 100 task cards, worksheets, recording sheets and answer keys! And yes, the black and white pages too!