Nines Drill For Teaching Addition and Multiplication Skills

Home > Math Activities > Nines Addition & Multiplication Drills

Multiplication skills are essential to any student progressing onto division or fractions. And the nines multiples are sometimes difficult for children to learn. But did you know that the nines are perhaps the easiest to remember if you utilize the following trick?

NINE TIMES N = a product with first digit (N -1) and second digit such that the digits add to 9!

Example 8 x 9 = 72 where 7 is one less than 8 and 7+2 = 9.

What is nice about doing the nines using this trick is that the student that has trouble adding will get a lot of practice with these skills as well since they will always be thinking "What must I add to the first digit in order to make a sum of 9?"

As an additional exercise for an algebra student, have the student show why this is true! This amounts to showing that the multiple N x 9 = 10 x (N-1) + (9 - (N - 1)).