Dr. Jones and Adam Dovico from the Ron Clark Academy posted Mall Math on their Instagram page @rockmathed. If you do not follow them you need to right now! As a fellow math teacher I love the excitement for math they are creating for their students and other teachers. Last semester they did an activity where they took all of their students to a local mall and did Mall Math. The students had to create various real world challenges and it was a hit. You can even download the activity here.
I loved the idea so much and I knew I could easily adapt this activity for my 3rd graders but there was just one problem. We are 3 hours from the nearest mall. I knew I could just recreate it in a classroom and but I wanted the students to be able to go to different places around the school to complete each challenge, just like the RCA students went to different places around the mall. That's when I came up with doing this same activity, but set it up like The Amazing Race!
I met with one of our 3rd grade teachers and we went over each of the Mall Math challenges and tweaked it to fit our 3rd graders's needs. It really didn't take that much time to do so. We then placed each challenge on a Amazing Race Challenge cards and also created road blocks.
Examples of the cards!
The Receipt Challenge
We had the challenges placed outside the office, library, cafeteria, gym, and computer labs. Each card told them what their challenge was and two stations had a road block. It was a huge hit and the students were able to review some essential numeracy skills. Below are some of the pictures from the Amazing Race!
Telling students about the challenge!
