The Absolute Zero card game is a good quick game for middle school students to practice adding positive and negative integers. Game play is very simple. There is a deck of number cards, with both positive (black) and negative (red) numbers. Each player keeps five cards in their hand, which they add together. On each turn they may draw a card from either the top of the discard pile or the top of the deck, then discard a card from their hand. As one of my students pointed out, that is the exact same play as Racko. When the sum of the cards in a player’s hand is 0 that player wins the round.
Once a player gets a value of zero in their hand, the other players record the absolute value of their hand (always a positive number). After 5 rounds the player with the lowest score wins.
Here is a youtube video made by the game’s creator to show game play in action.
The game also comes with directions for 3 other integer games you can play with the same deck.
There are 52 total cards with numbers ranging from -12 to 12 with no zeroes. The cards are high quality, sturdy and durable. They come in a plastic case.
The Absolute Zero card game was created by a parent, math teacher, and math curriculum and instruction specialist. See her website for other games.
I recommend this game because there are not many available fun games for students to practice integer operations. This one is fast enough to play and learn that it could easily be used in a classroom having students play each other without teacher involvement.
You can purchase through the above listed website or Amazon.
