Sunya The Magic and Wonder of Math and Science Multiplying and Dividing (TOS Review)

Today I'm sharing our experience of reviewing  Sunya The Magic and Wonder of Math and Science Multiplying and Dividing from Sunya Publishing.   This game is intended for children ages 9 and up. We received the parent/teacher guidebook, 2 packs of cards (one containing 60 number, wild and operation cards, the other containing 30 fact and riddle cards), and a number line to help with multiplying and dividing.

"Sunya" is a word from the ancient Sanskrit language of India.   The word itself actually means empty or void.   When playing the game, a player must say "Sunya" (pronounced as "soonya") before laying down their last card, indicating they are without cards.  This is the simplest direction to the game.

The 25 page, black and white teacher/parent guidebook covers rules for playing, the meaning of Sunya and the math facts and riddles.   The majority of the book is the instructional part, and I've got to say it was VERY confusing.

Truthfully, we all got very frustrated with the directions, and I don't know that we ever really played it the way it was supposed to be done.     What we did was have the dealer set up a problem (ex: 6x4=24) and then we dealt each player 4 cards.   The player to the left of the dealer then tried to make a new (and correct) math sentence based on the numbers already in play and the ones in their dealt hand.   If a player could not make a new number sentence, they then began drawing cards until they were able to make a new play.   We also played the game in reverse as a division problem such as 89 divided by 9=9, following the same procedure and rules described above.

The fact and riddle cards were used to quiz each other here and there, and the girls used them to try an stump my brother, as he's always giving them riddles.    They enjoyed having new riddles to use against him.

Despite the fact that we aren't sure we were playing it 100% correctly, we still had a great deal of fun.   I was surprised (and secretly very pleased) to see that my youngest was quick to find ways to make math sentences, often seeing ones that her father and I were missing.     We have yet to get to anyone going out and saying "Sunya"....we typically are on the same round for 40 minutes or more and by then we're all just done.

This is a great way to work in math facts/drills and make it fun instead of rote memorization.    Individual students can also play the game solo, working through the deck of cards and building new math sentences as they go.  Great review and speed builder for math facts!

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