Dr. Jennifer Bay-Williams, Professor of Education at the University of Louisville:
“These ready-to-go games are excellent tools for focusing on conceptual understanding and strategy development. The incremental progression of one game to the next helps students explicitly see how a strategy can be applied in one situation, and then as they play other similar games, they are able to generalize. Explicit strategy instruction via engaging games! Ideal games for families, tutors, regular classroom teachers, and special education teachers.”
Dr. Herbert Ginsburg, Jacob H. Schiff Foundation Professor of Psychology & Education at Teachers College, Columbia University:
“Hansen’s program, based on a sound research and theoretical foundation in contemporary psychology, offers an impressive collection of activities/games, many quite original, that are designed to teach basic mathematical concepts, procedures, and facts in interesting and enjoyable ways. The tasks make use of basic pedagogical devices like the 10-frame and employ simple language that adults and children both will find easy to understand. The program also presents assessment methods that allow the adult to select activities appropriate for the child’s current position in the developmental progression of math learning. The program can be useful for both teachers and parents.”
Anne Stevenson, an experienced teacher and teacher-mentor:
“Kathleen’s materials are so clearly written that any parent volunteer or student teacher could get started quickly and independently. This brilliantly researched program is like no other resource I’ve seen in my twenty years of teaching.”
Dr. Kathryn Nyman, a mathematics professor at Willamette University and a parent:
“As a mathematician and the parent of an elementary aged child, I am excited by the potential here. My child, who is not fond of math in school, was excited to try the games and found them engaging. I found the games to be effective at reinforcing the topics he was currently learning and an enjoyable way to introduce him to more sophisticated ideas. I appreciate that the games approach number sense from different vantage points. Looking at mathematical concepts from multiple directions helps create deep understanding and is an invaluable skill for making connections in later mathematics. Those looking for more background will find the text exceptionally thorough and well-researched. It addresses just about any question a parent or teacher might have related to implementing the games. It also gives an excellent overview of current understandings of how children learn arithmetic and the rationale behind the game approach to teaching these concepts.”
A parent of a third grader and a sixth grader:
“My third grader has been working with Kathleen Hansen’s math games now for a few weeks and has not only been learning multiplication faster, but in a fun way as well. The surprising bonus came with my 6th grade daughter. When she played the games with her younger sibling, many holes in her math knowledge came to light and are being filled in now! My 12-year-old is having just as much fun with the games as my 9-year-old.”
A parent of a fourth grader:
“My child was beginning to hate math homework, and was showing some serious gaps in his skills. I had researched apps and bought “fun” themed workbooks to no avail. BOARD GAMES has been a huge help to me in understanding how people learn number sense, and also to my son in rebuilding skills that will help him progress into more complex math.”
A parent of a first grader and a third grader:
“I was able to use the assessment and figure out where to start the children. I appreciated that I didn’t have to find a way to explain the concept being taught, but they picked it up on their own while playing the game.”
August 31, 2020; updated October 8, 2020