Ten Frame Cards

These ten frame cards cover the numbers 1 to 20, three cards per number, one card to a page. A ten frame is two rows of five boxes, and the dots always fill from the top left, so a child learns to see 7 as five on top and two below instead of counting each dot. From 11 on, the cards show two frames side by side, one full and one partly filled.

Three cards for each number

• Easy (one star). The frame and the numeral with its word underneath. Look and say.
• Challenge (two stars). Only the frame. Kids write how many dots, then finish a number sentence: how many more to make 10 for the numbers up to 10, or ten plus how many for the teens.
• Answer (three stars). The number, the word, an addition fact and the make-ten fact, so a child can check the Challenge card and explain it back.

The cards come in color bands by range: red for 1–5, green for 6–10 and blue for 11–20. The cover gives ages 3–7.

After the cards

A practice page has kids count dots in some frames and draw dots in others. Roll & Cover is a dice game played on a page of frames: roll, find the frame that shows your number, and cover it with a coin or button. The progress tracker has a star for each number at each level, and a tens page counts from 10 to 100 in full frames.

Printing

The cards print at full page size, big enough to hold up in front of a class. For hand-held cards, choose 4 pages per sheet in your print settings and cut on the corner marks. Laminated Challenge cards and the practice page can be reused with a dry-erase marker.

Questions

How big are the cards?

Each card fills a whole page, which works for showing to a group. For smaller cards, set your printer to print 4 pages per sheet and cut on the corner marks.

How are numbers above 10 shown?

With two ten frames side by side, one full and one partly filled, so 14 reads as ten and four more.