Guest Author - Amy Daniels

If you are a teacher working with a limited budget for school supplies or a parent needing some extra resources for your children, making your own math manipulatives can help. Many things commonly found around the house can serve as inexpensive replacements for reinforcing math concepts.

Math programs usually call for the following items: clocks, tangrams, pattern blocks, color tiles, hundreds chart, linking cubes, geoboards, play money, color counters, and teddy bear counters. Here are some things you may find around the house that can be used instead of the more pricey manipulatives available on the market.

Clocks: If you have a wall clock with hands you can use that to demonstrate time. For kids you can print out clock worksheets and a paper clock you can laminate and reuse at Enchanted Learning.

Linking Cubes: These are the cubes that stick together to make sets of 5, 10, 25 and so on. Legos and other snap together blocks make a perfect substitute for linking cubes. You can also draw block sets on paper and cut them out for use. Cover paper with clear contact paper for longer use.

Color Tiles, Color Counters, & Bear Counters Again Legos work well for any type of counters since they are already available in a number of colors and in large quantity. Other items that make good counters are beans, popcorn, marbles, coins, poker chips, and M&M's. Dice can also be used as counters and to help recognize numbers.

Tangrams: Tangrams consist of only 7 shapes. These shapes can be made out of posterboard, cardstock, or wood. You can add pelon or magnets to the back and use the shapes on a flannel board or fridge. The shapes you need are 2 large right triangles, 1 medium right triangle, 2 small right triangles, 1 medium square, and 1 parallelogram. Exact measurements for cutting tangram shapes can be found here.

Pattern Blocks: Follow the same instructions for making tangram blocks only make a lot of them. You can also make circles, rectangles, and octagons.

Geoboard: A Geoboard can be made from a square piece of wood and 25 finishing nails. Draw a grid of five evenly spaced vertical and horizontal rows and place nails where the lines intersect.

Hundreds Chart For a wall chart you can draw 100 squares with a ruler on a poster board and laminate or make mini charts for each kid by printing out a blank chart and letting them fill in the numbers. You can also find a complete hundreds chart already filled out and ready to print online.

Play Money Instead of buying play money, use the money in your monopoly game or any other game that has money. Or cut out a bunch of paper rectangles and let the kids design their own money.

Being creative in making your own manipulatives will help you save money so you can focus on buying things like balance scales, dominoes, and rulers. With a little imagination you can turn anything in your classroom or home into a teaching aid.