Cuisenaire and Pattern Blocks

The Shropshire Centre for Mathematics Education provides this resource which offers a selection of activities, using cuisenaire rods and pattern blocks, that allow students to discover a range of mathematical concepts such as equivalence, addition, difference, multiplication and fractions.

Pictures and patterns - students make pictures or patterns with complete freedom about the choice of rods or blocks. Filling already drawn outline pictures with rods or blocks provides a more exacting test of spatial awareness

Rods under the table - students identify specific rods by feel alone

Make up the difference - two rods are selected at random and students find the rod that will make up the difference between them

The story of yellow - picture making and shape filling lead to learning the relationships between the rods

Games of strategy - two players take turns to place rods of their choice within a given space

Dice and feely bag games - students discover the various was of partitioning shapes

Radiating patterns - students decide how to continue a pattern

Behind the screen - students ask questions to replicate a hidden outline

Transformations - blocks are transferred from one outline and rearranged into another

Join and separate - tests students' knowledge of the structural relationships between rods

Filling shapes investigations - students record the different ways of partitioning a designated outline

Who's covered most spaces - a strategy game to cover as many shapes on a board as possible

Symmetry - reflection pictures are made using rods or blocks

Rod furniture - prompts discussion about words and expressions to do with measures

Pattern block snake game - students win blocks, whoever makes the most hexagons is the winner