What Are Learning Stations and Why Use Them?

What are Learning Stations?

Learning stations (sometimes also called centers) are structured activities that students can work on independently or collaboratively while the teacher works with small groups. These stations help students to practice, explore, and deepen mathematical thinking.

Each station is designed so that students can engage in meaningful mathematical tasks without needing the teacher to provide constant direct support. The goal is for stations to:

• Provide differentiated opportunities for practice or exploration
• Encourage student agency and choice
• Promote discourse, reasoning, and problem solving
• Reinforce or extend the content introduced in the focus lesson
• Allow the teacher to give more individualized attention to small groups

Implementing learning stations is one of the “steps” within a larger math workshop structure.

Why Use Learning Stations?

There are several compelling reasons to embed learning stations in your classroom:

1. Maximize differentiated practice while the teacher meets with groupsBecause the teacher cannot be with every student at once, stations allow students to engage in productive mathematical activity while the teacher meets with small groups or individuals. Instead of idle time or unproductive worksheets, students are engaged in tasks that support their learning.
2. Build student independence and ownershipOver time, students learn routines of managing station work, self-monitoring, choosing which tasks suit their needs, and tracking progress. That independence is a powerful shift from whole-class instruction.
3. Promote discourse and peer learningWhen students work at stations in pairs or small groups, they can explain, question, and reason together. That discourse helps them refine ideas, catch errors, and push thinking further.
4. Flexibility & sustainabilityTeachers can swap, rotate, adjust, or redesign stations over time based on student needs, without reinventing everything for each unit. In fact, stations can remain all week and even return later in the year. This review idea will help students make mathematical connections among math topics and keep essential or priority standards at the forefront.

Learning stations help transform a math class from passive reception to active engagement, and from one-size-fits-all to responsive differentiation. Quality of stations is more important than quantity. So, it’s not recommended to add fluff to the stations just to ensure you have more options for students.

Looking for a learning station to use right away with little prep?

Printable Number Hive Boards are great and ready for any grade level!

As you look for high-quality station tasks, one that aligns nicely with the goals above is Number Hive — particularly its printable (offline) versions of game boards. Number Hive is a strategy-based game that emphasizes algebraic reasoning. The developers provide free printable game boards on their website.

Why Number Hive Works Well as a Station

In your journey implementing math workshop, learning stations are one of the most powerful levers you can use to differentiate, increase student engagement, and free you to work more intentionally with small groups. Number Hive works great as a station because it is:

• Engaging, strategic play: It’s structured like a game, so students perceive it as “fun” rather than drill, while still doing deep thinking about computation.
• Self-checking or low-stakes: The game format helps reduce anxiety; students can explore, test moves, and revise strategies.
• Scalable complexity: You can choose boards or levels appropriate to students’ fluency—some boards are simpler, others more complex.
• Ease of implementation: Since the printable boards are ready to go, you don’t need to design the task yourself. Just print, distribute, and show the students how to play.

Where to Find the Printables & How to Use Them

You can find the printable gameboards at
https://www.numberhive.app/number-hive-printouts/, and they are simple to add into your collection.

• Print and laminate boards (if that’s your thing), provide counters or tokens, and allow students to play in pairs or small groups.
• Provide a short reflection prompt (e.g. “Explain one strategic move you considered” or “What pattern did you notice?”) if you want to learn more about the students’ strategies.
• Rotate in different difficulty boards or versions as students’ fluency grows.

Using a ready-made, mathematically rich, and student-engaging station like Number Hive means you don’t have to invent every station task from scratch. It gives you a high-quality, game-based option you can drop into your math class with minimal prep. For teachers who want to start small, Number Hive printouts are a great place to begin.