Math Practice....Sumdog

Today I want to introduce you to one of my favorite math tools!  I discovered Sumdog this year and convinced my whole school to use it.  This is a site where students play games to practice basic math skills.  Over the years of teaching math, I found that my came to me lacking in a lot of computation skills.  This site allows them to practice skills that are specific to them while having fun.


Sumdog actually takes each individual student and forces them to practice the skills they are struggling with.  This could mean money, integers, even algebra.  They have the programs available for 1st through 6th grade.  I had my Kinder, 7th, and 8th do it too since practice never hurts.

The thing that first drew me to Sumdog was the fact that I can pull up reports on how the kids are progressing.  I can specify what I want to see.  My favorite is their current accuracy (shown here).  I can see how they are doing based upon specific grade level standards.

One of the cool things is the lessons I can set up.  If I have a whole class working on Sumdog, I can limit what they are allowed to be working on.  I can make them train, I can make them have a competition (they  love that), or I can let them have free reign.  The best part is it has a running side bar of how each student is doing so I can monitor more closely who needs help.

And the part the kids love....the games!  There are a TON of games students can play.  They can play against other students in their class, the world, or just against a robot.  They each earn animal ranks to see how many 'coins' they've earned over their whole lifetime of playing.  [I'm embarrassingly only at a Narwhal, that's only rank 3].

Students choose any game they want to play and the website will automatically alter it to suit their skill needs.  They can add 'friends' to their list, and even take the points/coins they've earned and buy clothes for their avatar from the shop.

I am moving to a new school next year to teach strictly math.  I'll be using this as one of my centers for sure.  The way I figure it, it doesn't matter how good at math or how old the students are; they still need practice.