Counting and Quantities for Preschoolers

 We have been working on counting and learning quantities.  Here are some of the activities we have been doing.

1.  Matching milkcaps to circles on filefolders

2.  Spelling numbers - I found these wonderful templates at Confessions of a homeschooler.  I use our foam magnetic letter along with this activity. 

3.  Counting Strip -  OK, I know this looks a bit ragged and it is.  I started with a sentence strip and every week or so I add another.  We count through these number every day. 

4.  Counting animals -  I lay out some of our beany babies and Adeline counts them.

5.  Making Marks -  I had some left over laminated pieces so I write a number, and Adeline makes that many marks with her dry erase pen.

6.  Magna Doodle Counting-  I write a number on our magna doodle and Adeline uses a refrigerator magnet to count out the correct quantity,

7.  Counting Bears -  Again I found these templates at Confessions of a homeschooler

8.  Fine Motor Counting -  Counting beans while we drop them into a bottle.

 

Learning Numbers and Quantities

We are working on numbers a lot lately.  Adeline has been very interested in counting so that is what we are working on.   Here are some of the things I have been doing with Adeline to help her learn her numbers and quantities.

The first thing I did was to make flashcards up to twenty.   I first had her learn how to identify the numbers.

 
Second thing we did was explore the teddy bear counters.

 
Before children can be expected to use a manipulative for a specific purpose they need some time to explore with it.  

Later, I drew some circles on file folders and we added the correct amount of bears to each circle.

We are also counting stickers on a file folder.

Adeline has really been enjoying her abacus now that she is starting to understand numbers.

One other thing that has helped Adeline learn her numbers is her favorite counting app on the I Pad call Toddler Counting.  This is a great simple app that teaches up to 20.

DIY Montessori 100's Board

Adeline has learned to recognize her numbers up to about 20 but not the order, so I have been wanting to work on that.  I really wanted to purchase this neat board on Amazon but now is not the time, so I made one for now.

I found a 100's chart at the Dollar Tree the other day so I cut it up and also purchased a foam poster board.
I laminated the squares and sorted them in groups of ten.  I wrote the first few numbers on because that is what we are working on right now.  I think the matching will help her get started.   I think I need to put a little velcro on yet so that they don't slide around.

Learning With A Box

Yesterday I was inspired when I visited The Happy Holligans.  I had an empty box laying around waiting to be used but I did not have an idea.  After visiting her "Drop Box" I had an idea.

I made a number box using our Rummy O tiles.  Adeline has been working on number identification so we dropped the number into the correct slot.

I covered a shoe box with paper, cut some slots, added a circle for the yogurt cup and we were ready to play.  This activity requires fine motor skills and eye hand coordination.   

Some other activities we have done in the past using recycled boxes are;

Milk Caps and a Box

Straws and a Box 

Pull Box

Cardboard boxes are great for teaching many different concepts.

Sensory Learning

Today we learned with corn starch.  Corn starch is a great inexpensive sensory item.  First we worked on scooping and spooning until that turned messy.  If you child needs to work on using a utensil these type of activities provide some extra practice and also work on fine motor skills.

We used both a scoop and a spoon.

Once things started to get messy and Adeline wanted to put her hands in it we moved on to a sensory bin with corn starch and numbers.  I have been teaching Adeline her numbers with flashcards but I like to reinforce everything with a game or activity of some sort.

One of my little tricks is, I love to find Scrabble games or Rummy O games at yard sales for a few cents.  I love using the tiles for different learning activities.  Today we used our Rummy O tiles to reinforce numbers.

Adeline enjoyed dusting for the tile to discover her number.

I admit we made quite a mess with this activity but it was fun.

Counting Flaps

We have been working hard around here with our counting and number quantities.  Using some file folders that I cut down, I made some counting flaps.  This flap is just to ten but it can be added onto.  There are five flaps per folder and I taped them together with duck tape on the back.  The quantity is on the outside and the number underneath.  You could write the word on the outside and the number underneath.  There are many possibilities.

Grabbing the flap and lifting it involves some fine motor skills as well.  If you child is young you could even uses pictures and do a peek a boo game just to work their fine motor skills.