Skip Counting Cards

These skip counting cards make learning times tables fun! Print them onto card, cut out and laminate if you wish for durability.

Ideas for using the cards:

• Younger children can begin by counting the sides of the first card in one set - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Then count on with the next card - 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 - and so on.
• Lay the cards face up in the right order in front of your child. Ask them to say the numbers as they turn each card face down. Now go back to the beginning and ask them to say the numbers before turning the cards over to check if they were right.

• Lay the cards from one set on the floor and have the children jump along next to them, counting as they go.
• Put the cards from one set in order face down, then turn them over one at a time reciting the numbers as you go.
• Muddle the cards of one set, face up, on the table. Challenge your child to put them back into order as quickly as possible.
• Muddle the cards of one set, face up, on the table. When you call out a sum - for example, 7x5 - your child must slap the correct card as quickly as possible. With two of more children you could make this a competitive game, with the first player to slap the card taking it. Count up the cards each child has "won" at the end.
• Muddle two or more sets together and challenge your child to separate the cards out into two separate times tables in the correct order.
• Cut out the pages in strips so that you can tape the strips together to form a colourful times table number line.
• Print the two pages out and place them side by side, or cut out the cards and glue inside a file folder for a more permanent game. Using a 12-sided die (or 2 normal dice, added together) and a set of coloured counters for each player, take turns rolling the die and placing a counter on the appropriate number. For example, when playing with the set of 5 cards, a roll of 6 would mean that you would place a counter on 30. If you roll a number which is already covered, you miss your turn. When all the numbers have a counter on them, count up to see who has the most. As a variation, you could allow players to "bounce" counters off the board if they have already been placed when they roll the same number.

Our skip counting cards matched up with some of our times table folding cards.