Number Walls to 10: Four Three-Course Addition Pyramids

Every wall on this 1st grade number walls page tops out at ten or less. Four pyramids are printed three courses high, each with three numbers already in the bottom row - 1, 1, 1 on the first, 3, 2, 3 on the third - and three empty bricks outlined in dashed orange above them. The rule is given once at the head of the page: each brick is the sum of the two bricks under it. Add the pairs, fill the middle row, then add those to set the top.

Small numbers are what let the structure be the lesson. When every sum is within ten, the child is not held up by the arithmetic and can see the thing that makes a number wall different from a column of sums: the middle brick of the base gets used twice, once on the left and once on the right. That surprises children the first time, and it is easier to notice when adding 3 and 2 costs no effort. The top brick is only right if both bricks below it are.

Print the PDF free and let the child use counters or a number line for the first wall, then work the other three without. Four walls is a short page and can be finished in one sitting. When sums to ten are automatic, the build every row version adds a fourth course and ten bricks per wall, and the missing brick version knocks a number out of the base and asks the child to work downward. Doubles and halves practise the same facts from another direction.