Reviewing Multiplication Facts

Purpose

To build fluency with a small set of multiplication facts in need of review

Materials

None

Overview

Pick a small number of multiplication facts (five or six at most) that you feel your students are weak at and, at a lively pace, quiz the students. To keep all students attentive, say the fact, such as 6 x 7, and then choose a student to respond. It can be helpful to use a set of cards with students’ names on them to make your choice of student more random. Put a student’s card back in the deck after they have been called, and not always at the very end, to keep them alert and waiting to be called on again.

About the sequence

Part 1 asks students to focus on 5–6 multiplication facts in need of practice. Part 2 asks students to multiply selected facts by 10, 100, or 1,000 (for example, 8 x 9 x 10 = 720).

Part 1

Let’s have some fun with our multiplication facts. I’ll call out a fact, then I’ll ask someone to answer and don’t be surprised if you hear a fact more than once. Here we go! (Select 5 or 6 facts that students would benefit from practice.)

Possible choices could include (12 x 7), (9 x 8), (12 x 11), (6 x 8), (7 x 6), (9 x 6)

While children are enjoying their building of mastery, feel free to repeat. When children are eager for more, try Part 2.

Part 2

This time, we’ll multiply the product of a selected fact by 10, 100 or 1,000.

Examples:

8 x 9 x 10 = 720
12 x 7 x 10 = 840
12 x 11 x 100 = 13,200
9 x 8 x 1,000 = 72,000
9 x 6 x 100 = 5,400
7 x 6 x 1,000 = 42,000