Multiplication Arrays

Inside the case file

Multiplication arrays worksheets for 2nd grade and 3rd grade, ten Mystery Detective style math review pages where students read the rows and columns and write the multiplication. Print and go with full answer keys and no prep, for math centers, morning work, early finishers, homework and sub plans, in color or black and white. Five cases ask for the product and five ask for the factors, so the same array gets read both ways, twelve arrays a page, and each answer crosses off a suspect until the teacher who turned into a monster is the only one left; a miscounted row matches nobody, so the CSI Mini Mystery Detective pack keeps them honest without you.

Arrays are where repeated addition stops being the quick way and multiplication starts being worth learning, and asking for factors on one page and the product on the next is what makes a class read rows and columns rather than count dots. Ten cases give the idea long enough to hold without ten identical worksheets. Math practice with a Mystery Detective on every page.

The Ten Cases

• Cases one to five - read the array, write the product
• Cases six to ten - read the array, write the factors
• Twelve arrays on every case, each answer knocking out a clue
• Rows and columns both change, so nothing can be counted by habit
• One running story: a teacher in the school has turned into a monster

What's Inside

• Ten case files in full color
• The same ten cases again in black and white for cheap printing
• Answer keys for every case
• Five monster wanted posters for the classroom wall
• A wanted poster and banner deck to put the hunt on the wall
• A teacher instruction page - print and go, nothing to cut or laminate

What Is a CSI Mini Mystery Detective?

One printed page holding one crime and the clue lists that solve it. Each clue has a number against it, the twelve questions on the page produce those numbers, and a correct answer knocks a clue out. Work to the last array and a single suspect is left standing. Get one wrong and nothing matches, so the page marks itself.

When to Use This Resource

Reach for this in the weeks between skip counting and the first times tables, when a class can add equal groups but has not yet met the multiplication sign in earnest. It works just as well at the start of 3rd grade as revision before facts are pushed for speed. Use it for math centers, morning work, early finishers, homework, sub plans and homeschool lessons, with a whole class, a small group, partners or one student on their own.

Grade Levels

Written for 2nd grade and 3rd grade. Second graders meet arrays here for the first time, and third graders use the set as a warm up before multiplication facts begin.

Why Teachers Love These Cases

• Products and factors both covered, so the array is read two ways
• A wrong answer matches no clue, so students mark themselves
• Color and black and white are both in the download
• The posters turn a worksheet into a classroom display

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