Memory (Home-Made Version)

The previous post, Memory, explains the mathematical benefits of playing the game. This post shows how one can make a home-made version. Making a home-made version can be a rich, integrative experience with your children as it involves reading, writing, and fine motor skills.

Materials needed: images, scissors, glue or tape, material for making cards

Step One:

Finding Images: search your recycling or mail for catalogs, magazines, or advertising flyers with photos. Challenge your child to find pairs of items that can match such as two lawn mowers, bicycles, etc. Hand them a pair of scissors and ask them to cut them out.











After your child cuts the images out, trim the excess around them. As you trim, talk with your child about the name of each item. What an item is called may be different depending upon where you live. For example, are they a pair of pants or a pair of slacks?

Step Two:

Making the cards: Next look for a material to use to make the cards. If you have an old deck of cards with some missing cards, this will be perfect! Block out the existing image with masking tape to provide a space for your images. Other materials that can be used are old Christmas cards, envelopes, or cereal boxes. For the rest of this post, we will be using a cereal box. 







Regardless of what you use to make the cards, work to make them uniform in size. This is a good opportunity to model using a ruler and standard units of measurement. Think aloud, modeling what you are thinking as you use the ruler. I want to make them 2 1/2 inches wide and 3 1/2 inches wide...

Step Three: 

Attaching Images to Cards: Use tape or glue to put the images on the cards. If you are lucky to have clear shipping tape in the house, this is perfect. 

You can easily address literacy learning by asking your child to help you label the pictures using a sharpie. 

What sound do we make at the beginning when we say shirt or shoes? Help me remember what two letters make the /sh/ sound. 

Step Four:

Checking the Pairs: Ask your child to help you check to make sure you have a pair of each object. 

If you have labeled your cards with a sharpie, point to the words and do a bit of reading as you check. 

Remind me what this says. Hat? What sound do you hear at the end of hat? What letter makes that sound?

Step Five: 

Begin to Play: Mix up the cards and lay them out in an array. If you are working with an older child, you can model talking about rows and columns if you want. 

I can make two rows with six cards in each row. But that leaves me with only four at the bottom. I wonder what would happen if we put seven cards in a row? Eight? 

If you have a very young child, start by only putting 4 pairs out at first. As they gain confidence, add more pairs to the deck to challenge them. 

Begin to play as directed in the previous post. You may think that your child will recognize the pairs by the print of the cereal box. If they do, they have an excellent memory! 

Tomorrow's post: Tapatan!

Memory

This is a very simple game that most preschoolers can play successfully. Kindergarten, first, and second graders enjoy it as well. The mathematical concepts that can be addressed: the concept of pairs, counting, counting in twos, more and less.

This game can be played with any matching cards. Many different sets of matching cards are available commercially with various pictures, such as farm animals, insects, birds, household items, paintings by famous artists, etc. Standard playing cards or number cards can also be used. The number of pairs used to play the game should remain low (around 6 pairs) for the youngest players. With older children, more pairs can be used.

When children first play this game, they tend to choose cards at random; they often do not replace cards in the same place from which the cards were taken; and many times they do not pay attention to which cards other players turn over. As they become more experienced at playing this game, they begin to figure out that watching the other players turn over cards will give them useful information.

An interesting way that young children often play Memory is that when children see a player turn over a card and they think they know where its match is, when it is their turn they will often turn over the card that was just turned over first, and then try to find its match. Adults recognize that if they are not positive about where a card is placed, they should turn over the card that they are not sure about first, so that if they are wrong, they have not wasted a turn.

Young children often play Memory cooperatively. That is, when a player turns over a card and another player knows where its match is, that child will often tell the player which card to turn over in order to make a match. Here is a video of 4-year-olds playing the game: https://regentsctr.uni.edu/sites/default/files/videos/original/memory_0.mp4

The versions of Memory sold in most stores are made by Hasbro. You may already have this game. If not, you can download and print these files for use at home: 

Memory cards: https://regentsctr.uni.edu/sites/default/files/games/Games/Memory/Memory_Cards.pdf

Memory game board: https://regentsctr.uni.edu/sites/default/files/games/Games/Memory/Memory_Grid.pdf

Memory rules: https://regentsctr.uni.edu/sites/default/files/games/Games/Memory/Memory_Rules.pdf

If you do not have a printer or enough ink at home, check the next post for how to make a home-made memory game.