David Pleacher
Candy Math Fun
Few things can motivate children to learn like the promise of a sweet and tasty treat. Given a bag of M&M®s, Skittles®, or other colorful candy, students first predict the contents of the bag before counting the pieces, creating a...
Curated OER
Jelly Bean Math Activities
Using jelly beans as math manipulatives can be a tasty way to introduce and reinforce math concepts. Regardless of the time of year, candy can be used to excite learners and facilitate a wide variety of mathematical concepts.
Yummy Math
Which Sweet Heart Candy Is the Best Deal?
Get the most Valentine's candy for your money with a fun math activity! After examining three deals for buying candy hearts in bulk, young mathematicians decide which deal is the best and use bar graphs to demonstrate their claim. They...
Yummy Math
Which is the Best Deal on Candy?
Buying enough candy for trick-or-treaters without spending a lot of money can be the ultimate Halloween trick. Middle schoolers solve two holiday-themed word problems to determine which brand of candy is the better deal, based on cost...
Yummy Math
US Holiday Candy Sales
Candy is a big business! Calculate the amount of money consumers spent on major holidays—Easter, Halloween, Christmas, Hanukkah, and Valentine's Day—based on the total amount of candy sales from 2011 and the percentage of each holiday's...
CK-12 Foundation
Mental Math to Evaluate Products: Mental Math Halloween Candy
Time to put those mental math strategies into play with an interactive that has learners thinking about how many candies three friends get altogether.
Curated OER
Candy Machine
Using the concept of a candy vending machine, young mathematicians explore the sugar ratios found in different types of candy. Using the provided information, class members calculate and compare different ratios in order to find the...
Illustrative Mathematics
Christina's Candies
Help Christina figure out how many chocolate and lemon candies she has with a lesson on decomposing numbers. When presenting this context to the class, the teacher chooses the total number of candies and the number that are chocolate,...
Mathematics Assessment Project
Designing 3d Products: Candy Cartons
Wouldn't it be great to work in a candy factory? Learners get their chance as they first design a carton for a candy that meets certain requirements. They then examine and analyze nets and explanations in sample student responses.
Utah Education Network (UEN)
Candies R Us
A box is fun to make, especially when it's a candy box! These activities help to cement understanding of the difference between surface area and volume. Have individuals measure the surface area of their box in two-dimensions before...
Odyssey of the Mind
Odyssey of the Mind Curriculum Activity: Made Up Math
Is there a way to connect creative thinking, logical reasoning, mathematical understanding, and humor? You bet there is! Kids begin by creating creative math quizzes, which require creative thinking to solve. For example, 1+1=24, one...
Curated OER
M&M’s Math Worksheet
Who knew you could cover prediction, histograms, fractions, decimals, data collection, and averages (mean, median, and mode) all with a bag of M&M's®? Here's a fantastic set of worksheets to help you make candy a mathematical journey...
Curated OER
Candy Bar Measurements
Geometers explore mathematics by completing an object measurement worksheet. They utilize a variety of candy bars and rulers to conduct a measurement experiment in class. They complete worksheets as a group based on the measurement...
Curated OER
M&M Science and Math
A series of math and science activities feature M&M's® as manipulatives to help kids work through equations. The resource includes exercises on finding averages, percent of compositions, moles in chemical reactions, genotypes and...
Curated OER
Grab the Candy Hearts
For this candy activity, learners play the game Grab the Candy for Valentine's Day where they roll dice to find ordered pairs on a graph and place the candy inside that square. Students play until all candy is gone and use the scoring...
Curated OER
Chocolate Bar Math
How many ways can you use a chocolate bar to engage mathematical reasoning? This slideshow gives you seven to choose from. Part/whole, fractions, counting, and using chocolate bars as arrays are only a few. Note: This is a presentation...
American Statistical Association
A Sweet Task
Candy is always an effective motivator! A fun math activity uses M&M's and Skittles to explore two-way frequency tables and conditional probability. The candy can serve a dual purpose as manipulatives and experimental data.
Curated OER
"Eggs-ploring" Math with Jellybeans
Learners work in pairs with a small bag of jellybeans to estimate the number of candies in their bags and then figure out how many groups of 10 jellybeans are contained in their bags. They then graph the information using a pictograph or...
Curated OER
Valentine Candy Count
Here is an imaginative take on a classic lesson! Young scholars discover what color Valentine Candy is found more often than any other in a standard bag of Valentine Conversation Hearts. They observe, predict, sort, and classify the data...
Curriculum Corner
Learning Fun with Hershey Bars
Compiled of 18 task cards and five worksheets, young mathemmaticians practice solving fraction word problems and other fraction-based activities with a Hershey Bar. The packet comes with sheets to record and keep track of all of the task...
Curated OER
Data Analysis and Probability: Graphing Candy with Excel
Collect and graph data using Microsoft Excel with your math class. They will make predictions about the number of each colored candy in a bag of M&M's, then sort, classify, count, and record the actual data before using Excel to...
Primary Resources
Venn Diagrams
Combine your lessons on Venn diagrams, probability, and multiples with several activities. After picking seven cubes, learners note the number of cubes that are blue and mark them in a Venn diagram. The next assignments prompt them to do...
Illinois Valley Community College
STEM Activities for Middle School Students
Use STEM activities within the class to provide connections to concepts. The resource includes activities that range from working with buoyancy to building rockets and launching them. Other activities involve the engineering design...
Lesson This!
Math Lesson Plan: Halloween Candy Counting
Post-Halloween learners bring in candy treats to use for counting practice. They estimate how full a bowl of candy will get when there are 100 and 200 pieces of candy counted and put in it. They take turns counting to 100 and 200;...