Pi Day Dice Challenge

This Pi Day Dice Challenge was inspired by a twitter post from Texas Math Teacher. I created a free downloadable template that can be used to host a Pi Day Dice Challenge Tournament in your own classroom. Just add dice!

I decided to take the idea and run with it. I created a template to give my students to help them organize their dice as they attempted to roll the first 10 digits of pi in order.

I didn’t have enough 10-sided dice for all of my students to have ten at the same time, so I chose a few students at a time who wanted to compete.

Students grabbed a 10-sided die, and rolled it repeatedly until they rolled a 3. Then, this die was set on top of the 3 on the template. They continued to grab a new die and roll for the next digit.

One student did pay attention to the directions at all. He thought you just picked up each die and twisted it around in your hand to show the correct number before laying it down…

This worked, but it took FOREEEEEEEEEEEEEVVVVVVVVVVEEEERRRRR. I had planned to make it into a sort of tournament, but it took so long that I couldn’t see asking students to do it again.

I went back to my template and shortened it to rolling the first 5 digits of pi.

This worked SO much better. I continued using 10-sided dice because I already had them out. Later, when I was reflecting on the activity I realized I could have used standard six sided dice to make the activity even quicker and easier.

So, if you have access to 10-sided dice, you can use them for an extra added challenge. But, standard dice are just fine. I had a set in my classroom that have the digits written on them instead of dots.

Because this five digit version was much quicker and easier, we were actually able to have a Pi Day Dice Challenge Tournament.

I quickly generated a tournament bracket to post on the SMARTBoard.

My students really enjoyed this activity. It was a fun addition to our Pi Day Celebrations.

Why has it taken me three years to get around to sharing this activity? I blame it on the fact that life has a tendency to be super crazy right around Spring Break. In 2018 when I originally did this activity with my kids, I found myself in the middle of the Oklahoma Teacher Walkout just a few short weeks after Pi Day. This threw everything off.

During Pi Day 2019, I was heavily pregnant, had no energy, and I wasn’t really blogging about anything. Pi Day 2020? One word: pandemic. I fully intended to get this blog post written in time for Pi Day 2021. Obviously, that didn’t happen.

That’s why I’m taking a different approach. I’m blogging about it now in April 2021 so the post is ready to go for Pi Day 2022!