1st Grade Games

How to choose games for a 1st grader

First grade is the year recognizing turns into doing. A kindergartner can find a word or count a group; a first grader is expected to read a simple sentence, write it, and add and subtract within twenty without counting every time. The most useful thing to know when choosing games for 1st graders is to look for that step up, from spotting the right answer to producing it.

Keep it short and daily. Five to ten minutes of focused practice, then a game as the reward, does more than a long session that ends in a battle. Sitting alongside for the first minute or two, and letting your child explain what they are doing, is where a lot of the learning happens.

Math within twenty comes first

First grade math is narrower than it looks and it is mostly about fluency: adding and subtracting within twenty until the facts are quick, seeing a number like 34 as three tens and four ones, comparing two numbers, and telling time to the hour and half hour. The math section above practices exactly that range, and the flashcards keep showing the facts your child still misses.

The fact everyone assumes is automatic, and often is not yet, is making and breaking ten. A child who knows that 6 and 4 make 10, and that 10 and 3 make 13, has the key to every harder sum. Number bonds and the make-ten deck build that one piece.

Reading is the other half of the year

Alongside math, first grade is when reading becomes real. Two things carry it: the common sight words that appear on every page and often cannot be sounded out, and the digraphs, the sh, ch, th and wh sounds that unlock hundreds of words. A few minutes of sight word and phonics practice a day, with the words your child knows dropping out automatically, is the whole method.

If a word will not come, go back to the sounds said out loud with no letters in front of them. Hearing three or four sounds and pushing them into a word has to be easy before a child can also read them off the page.

How to tell your child is ready for the next step

Each part has a signal it has landed. Math: your child answers a fact within twenty without counting on fingers, and reads 47 as four tens and seven ones. Reading: they read a first grade sight word instantly, with no pause. Writing: letters and numbers start in the right place and travel the right way, which matters more than neatness. Time: they read a clock to the hour and half hour.

When most of that is comfortable, the first times tables and real spelling in our 2nd grade learning games are the next step. If it still feels like a stretch, there is nothing wrong with more time on the kindergarten games first.

Away from the screen

Every skill here works off a device too. Count on by tens up the stairs, spot sight words on signs and cereal boxes, and ask what time it is when the clock reads something tidy. The printables above give you addition and subtraction sheets, sight word cards and tracing pages for the table, and each one makes fresh problems every time you print it.