Countdown

As a student I enjoyed watching the Channel 4 television programme Countdown and quickly realised the benefits of the numbers game as a mental warm up activity in line with the British National Numeracy Strategy that was introduced while I was training.

The following notes are based on some that I produced for parents to use at home with their children. Please feel free to print this page and use it either in lessons if you are a teacher, or at home if you are a parent or someone (young or not so young) who just wants to challenge themselves at maths.

The set of numbers contains:

          2 of each number 1-10
          1 of each number 25, 50, 75, 100
          2 diamond cards

The diamond cards can be any number from 1 to 10 but may only be used once. (The grid below used stars rather than diamonds . The downloadable version does have diamonds.)

I have used various methods of doing countdown over the last three years. The one that has gone down really well is to leave out the 75 and always have a 10 fixed in the selection as it makes getting to bigger numbers slightly easier. The cards are laid out so that the large numbers are in one row and the others are in several other rows. The children have to pick 5 numbers at random to go with the ten. The children have been told which row has the large numbers (usually the one closest to me).

Once the numbers have been selected they can be revealed and a target number maybe chosen. You can either pick a number at random or do a quick sum in your head to create a target number. The highest possible target number is 999 but they may go as low as you like. I have not used one below 100 but you may want to.

Each number may be used once and the diamond card may only be used once to represent one number. Adding, subtracting, multiplying or dividing may be used. You do not need to use every single number and it may be good to start with target numbers where a few numbers are not needed.

The time limit I usually set is one minute but you can vary this as you like.

In class I often award points and have been known to give stickers to the children with the highest score after a few rounds. My scoring system is:

10 points for getting the target number.

5 points for getting within 10 on either side of the target number if no one got the target number.

The Countdown Number Grid

1	1	2
2	3	3
4	4	5
5	6	6
7	7	8
8	9	9
10	10	25
50	75	100
*	*

If you have any comments you would like to make to me about Countdown, or if you have a question to ask you can contact me by clicking here or by using the link on the home page.

Update - 25/9/02 - While putting together another website I discovered a random number generator on the Internet which is perfect for countdown. It can be found on the page listed here.

Update - 23/11/02 - A downloadable version of this number grid is available here.

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