Preparation: Glue uppercase and lowercase letters and digits 0-9 (or more) to each cube and cover with clear nail polish for durability. Make several sets of each. Make sets of opposite words, rhyming words, sight words and punctuation cubes.
1. These are great for practicing the alphabet. You can link them together using all uppercase, all lowercase or uppercase A-lowercase a.
2. Put each child’s name in a zip lock bag for name practice.
3. You can build words with them.
4. They are great for word families too. Have (a-t) linked together and ask what letter can go in front to make a word.
5. Link together word opposites like, big-small, or long-short.
6. Link together words that rhyme like red-bed, or tall-fall.
7. Practice reading sight words that are on the cubes. Make a tower of correct and incorrect words. Try again on the incorrect words. Try to make a giant tower with all the sight words correct.
8. Build sentences with word and punctuation cubes.
9. Have the children cover the outline of a large letter on an 8”-11” paper.
10. Count the red cubes.
11. Great for measuring objects. How many cubes long is your pencil?
12. You can make color patterns for the children to copy. Example: Red, red, blue, blue, red, red, blue, blue. As students are creating patterns using connecting cubes, teachers can ask them to describe different patterns that they find in different sequences of cubes. Have the children create and describe their own patterns.
13. Practice ordering numbers 0-9.
14. Link the even numbers together. Link the odd numbers together.
15. Start with one cube, next to it put two cubes, then three cubes. (This works best when you make towers that lay flat on their backs)
16. Race to Make a Staircase- Object of the game is to build a staircase. (1 tower of 1 unifix cube, a tower of 2, a tower of 3, ...until a tower of 6. You stand them next to eachother so they look like stairs. This is a partner game. Player 1 rolls the dice and builds a tower of that many cubes. Player 2 does the same. They keep going until someone comletes a staircase of 6. If a player rolls a number they already have, they lose that turn.
17. Race to Make 30. Similar object--using unifix cubes, make a long tower of 30. Each player rolls the dice and adds that number of cubes to the tower. This tower has to stay flat on the ground. Keep going until 30. Partner game.
18. Practice adding or subtracting with the cubes.
A. The teacher will give each child 2 unifix cubes.
B. The teacher will ask the students to write down how many unifix cubes they have on paper (2).
C. The students should then write a + sign below the number 2, like this:
+2
+
D. The teacher will then pass out 3 more unifix cubes to each student.
E. The students will be asked to write down how many unifix cubes they were just given. They should write this number below the number 2 that they just wrote, so that it looks like this:
+2
+3
F. Students should now draw a line under their 3.
G. Now the students should count how many unifix cubes they have together and write this number just below the 3, like this:
+2
+3
----
+5
