Fact Family Houses

I had been working with my Curly Girlie on her addition and subtraction facts.  I really wanted her to see the connection between addition and subtraction - how it's the same numbers, just switched around.  And then it popped into my head today - Fact Family Houses!

These are not a new idea.  But they are simple to pull together in a moment's notice.  And certainly more fun than another worksheet or another run with the flashcards!

The kids were busily working on their seatwork when the idea struck. So I grabbed a stack of construction paper and my paper cutter and began cutting.  Here is what I did today to create these cute Fact Family Houses for my Curly Girlie to put together:



1. I cut several 6 inch squares.  I set some aside to be the houses and others I cut again - diagonally - for the roofs. 

2. I used some of my scraps to cut small one inch squares for the numbers.

3. I laid them out so I could write the plus, minus and equal signs onto the houses.  I thought this would offer her some guidelines for spacing things out evenly, as well as show her how many facts she needed per house.

4. Then I chose the fact families that I wanted her to work on.  I wrote the three numbers on one of the roofs and I wrote the numbers again on the 1 inch squares making sure I had one for each fact.

Here she is hard at work building one of her Fact Family Houses! 

And here she is with 3 of her houses complete - in no time!  She loved it!!!  I hung them on our window, so she can review them often.  I really think a connection is already starting! 

Sometimes I'm too quick to pass off an opportunity to do something different because I didn't have time to prepare it in advance.  That's why I really had to share this one right away!  It really was so simple to throw together and well worth it! 

Have fun building your own Fact Family Houses!