Evidence-based curriculum for ages 2-8

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18 Engaging Subtraction Activities for Early Elementary Students 

Kids will love these creative ways to practice their subtraction skills! 

Mother and daughter working on learning math skills together.

1. Sticks and Dice 

Give your child a stack of wood craft sticks (10 is a good place to start). Roll a die and remove that number of sticks from the stack. Write out the equation and determine how many sticks are left. Repeat until all the sticks are gone. You can play this game with any number of sticks and roll two dice to practice more challenging equations. 

Colored popsicle sticks.

2. Playdough Smash

Childs hand holding a ball of play dough.

3. Drive and Subtract 

Child playing with toy cars.

4. Flashcard Toss 

Child holding a flashcard.

5. Subtraction Bowling 

Pick up an inexpensive bowling set at the dollar store or make your own from empty plastic bottles. Set up the pins, then take turns bowling and knocking them down, keeping track by writing out the equations each time. 

Child playing with plastic bowling pins.

6. Hide and Subtract 

7. Domino War 

Child playing with dominos.

8. Roll to Zero 

Children rolling dice.

9. Snack Subtraction 

Snack mixes are perfect for this subtraction activity, but you can do it with any snack that comes in small pieces. Start by sorting and counting your snacks. Then, eat a few, counting as you go. Determine how many should be left, then count to see if you’re right. 

Bowl of snacks.

10. Cooking Math

Child and mother in the kitchen cooking together.

11. Calendar Countdown 

Child writing on a calendar.

12. Budget Shopping 

13. Are We There Yet? 

Family in the car playing a game together.

14. Temperature Tracking 

Buy an outdoor thermometer or weather station and track the temperature, figuring out the differences at various times of day. You can also compare temperatures from one day, week, season, or year to the next. 

A thermometer showing the temperature outside.

15. Step Counting 

A small child looking at his watch.

16. Subtraction Videos and Songs 

17. Online Subtraction Games 

Bubble subtraction game on ABCmouse.com.

18. Kindergarten Math Worksheets 

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