Up & Down, Add & Subtract – Elevator Math!

At the library, I stumbled on a wonderful math word problem book – Arithme-Tickle by J. Patrick Lewis. The first problem in the book is about a mailman that rides the elevator up and down delivering letters and packages. Readers have to use their math skills to figure out what floor he eventually ends up on.

It was the inspiration for this little game - Elevator Math!!

What You Need

24-floor skyscraper picture (download it here)

Lamination

Fine-tip dry-erase markers

2 regular dice

1 adapted UP and DOWN die (visit my Slide-A-Story activity for a download)

Notebook paper and pencil (optional)

Prep

To play, write six destinations on different floors of the laminated skyscraper (e.g. swimming pool, vet, chocolate shop, toy store, art studio, cheese factory, cafeteria, karate dojo, etc.).

Objective
See how many of the special destinations you visit while “riding” the elevator 11 times.

Play

Roll the two regular dice. Add the dots together. Roll them again and add all the dots together. The total of these four dice rolls equal the floor that you start on.

Next, roll the three dice. Add the dots on the two regular die together and, if the third die reads “UP,” add the totaled number to the floor number you are on; if the other die reads “DOWN,” subtract the number from the floor number you are on. Then, color a window on that floor and make a tally mark. Roll the three dice 9 more times until you have 10 tally marks on your skyscraper page, adding/subtracting and coloring the floors.

THE ROOF/BASEMENT: If the player ends up on the roof or in the basement, have him/her circle the word “roof” or “basement.” When on the roof, there’s only one way to go: down. The opposite is true for a player stuck in the basement. A total of the two regular dice determines how far up/down the player goes. For example, if the player is stuck on the roof and rolls a seven, they’ll descend 7 floors to floor 17.

My son has played this game three times since I made it. Even though it's as much a game in pretend as it is a math exercise, my son was thrilled this last time to finally "pay a visit" to LEGOland!