Chip Clip UNO Sums

UNO cards are such a great resource for number work and for this activity we teamed them up with magnetic chip clips to attempt some basic addition.

Chip clip UNO sums.

What you need:

- a pack of UNO cards

- magnetic chip clips (I managed to get colour coded ones)

- white card '+' and '=' signs

- a magnetic surface (we used the side of our cooker)

- lots of fingers for counting with!

The set up.

How it works:

I set up a few basic sums for my son to attempt. He has not had much exposure to addition therefore I took a bit of time to explain the concept and what the white signs meant. We also took some time to open and close the chip clips, ok so maybe this took lots of time but it certainly got him engaged with the activity.

He started off with a simple '1 + 2 = ?' sum. Logically he said '3' straight away because he thought it was number sequencing (silly Mummy for choosing a confusing sum for the first one!). We overcame this issue by using his fingers- one hand for the number on left card and one hand for the number on the right card.

Using fingers to complete the sum.

Once he counted all the fingers and knew the answer he had to choose the correct green UNO card and clip it after the '=' sign.

Selecting the green '3' as his answer.

My son continued to work hard using his fingers to add the cards together and then clip the answer card to the empty chip clip.

Look at that concentration!

Completing his final sum.

A very simple activity but as it involved fun resources it made introducing addition to my son accessible and exciting. We have left the chip clips and cards up so that my son can use them whenever he likes (apart from when the oven is on!!).