We do a lot of activities in my classroom that involve dice. Almost every day during math work stations the sounds of dice rattling and rolling can be heard. Which is great, except for the part where they really get on my nerves while I'm working with my small groups!
In the interests of preserving my sanity I decided to craft some dice that would not make all that noise. A couple of sponges, scissors, ruler and a permanent marker were all I needed.
The sponges I purchased were about 1 inch thick, so I started by cutting 1 inch strips. I accidentally picked ones with wavy edges -- no problem, I just trimmed them off.
Using the permanent marker, I put dots 1 inch apart the length of the strip and cut.
Then I simply numbered the sides from 1 to 6 (of course I plan to do some with higher numbers also!). My package of sponges had one green and one purple, so green became my numbered dice and purple my operations dice.
There you have it -- my strategy to keep my sanity! And for a great way to store your dice, hop on over to Little Miss Kindergarten to read about using a simple craft / tool box (I picked mine up at Walmart).
And for more fun, I'm linking up with 4th Grade Frolics "Monday Made it." Click the button and check it out.