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Skip Count Safari

Skip CountingGrades 1–2 ⏱ ~15 min

Hop in the safari jeep! A trail of stepping stones stretches ahead with numbers — but some are missing. Look at the pattern: are you counting by 2s, 5s, or 10s? Tap the correct number tile to fill in the blank stone. Get it right and the jeep hops forward! Discover new safari animals along the way. Complete the whole trail to finish the safari!

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How to play

Lions, zebras and giraffes line up on the savanna while you guide a safari jeep along a trail of stepping stones. Each trail shows six numbers with one stone left blank — tap the tile that continues the skip-counting pattern (2, 4, ?, 8 … or 5, 10, ?, 20 …). Patterns count by 2s, 5s and 10s. A correct tap lights up the stone and drives the jeep forward; a wrong tap costs a life and the same stone stays open to try again. Every two correct answers a new safari animal appears, and ten correct answers complete the safari.

What your child will learn

  • Develop number sense and estimation

Skills practiced

  • Pattern recognition
  • Mental math

Why this age range

Recommended for grades 1–2 because that's when skip-counting is curriculum-aligned but multiplication has not yet started in earnest. By the end of second grade most children should be fluent in 2s, 5s and 10s — exactly the three patterns this game practises — and the number ranges stretch further as a child keeps answering correctly, bridging toward third-grade multiplication.

Curriculum standards

  • CCSS.MATH.2.NBT.A.2
  • CCSS.MATH.3.OA.C.7

Notes for parents

Skip-counting is the on-ramp to multiplication that almost no one names as such. A child who skip-counts fluently by 5s already knows 5×1, 5×2, 5×3 — they just call it counting. Pointing this out at the right moment ("that's the same as 5 times 4!") accelerates the transition from counting-based math to fact-based math. Watch for the click and celebrate it.