Counting Puzzles

I found a really cool counting puzzle at a church rummage sale. For the number one, it has the number on one puzzle piece, a picture of one kite on another puzzle piece, and the number one spelled out on a third, each of these pieces fitting together. Then a piece with the number 2, a piece with 2 butterflies or something, and the number two spelled out. The puzzle is set up so that the picture of 6 cats only fits with the puzzles pieces "6" and "six." It goes from numbers 1-20. I was really surprised when we got it out and my daughter actually counted 20 items almost perfectly. She LOVES putting the puzzles together. And then we put them in order 1-20, which is another challenge altogether.

Seasons of the Year, Part 2

Today we expanded our seasons lesson from yesterday.  We used the seasons wheel we made yesterday, and we drew on it things we do in each of the seasons.  Swimming in summer, playing with leaves in fall, ice skating in winter, and flowers in spring.  

I got an ice cube tray out of the freezer, and we skated on the cold ice with our finger nails, like we skate in the winter.  Then we put an ice cube in a mug and heated it up in the microwave (she initiated counting while we waited, and so we counted the seconds to 35, although she can only make it to around 29 at this point) - it melted into water!  The water was warm, like you would want to swim in in the summer.  My daughter wanted more, and so we ended up melting all the ice cubes in the microwave.  The we put more water into the tray, put the tray back in the freezer, and later today we're going to see what happened to the water in the freezer. 

For autumn, we cut out five simple red construction paper leaves.  We took turns being the "tree."  Our arms were the branches, and we held the leaves in them, then we let them fall to the floor singing a song we learned in music class ("Leaves are falling, softly floating, tumbling to the ground....").  We ended up letting all our stuffed animals and dolls have a turn being the tree, too. 

Seasons of the Year

Today we focused on the seasons of the year.  We cut a piece of paper into a circle and folded it into 4 parts.  We counted 1-2-3-4.  Then on the four sections, I wrote "winter," "spring," "summer," and "fall" respectively.  We drew and colored pictures of what trees look like in each of the seasons in their sections - in winter no leaves, in spring green leaves with flowers, in summer green leaves under a hot sun, in fall colored leaves falling to the ground.  I taught her the ASL sign for "fall" ( couldn't remember the signs for the other seasons right off the top of my head, or I would have done that, too).  I drew arrows between the sections and talked about how they go from one to the other.  Then we went round and round the circle, signing "cold" for winter, "warm" for spring, "hot" for summer, and "cool" for fall.  When we were done, I asked her if she wanted to go outside and see the leaves falling to the ground - of course, she did.  So we went outside (we took our dog with us) and ran around the yard, kicking the leaves and playing chase with our dog.  I was going to rake them, but they were so beautiful as they were I couldn't bring myself to do it...

Apples

We did this over the course of a couple of days, not in the order delineated below.  We started with the construction paper.  In any case, here were our apple activities:  

I took a knife and cut an apple.  We looked at and learned the names of the core, the seeds, the stem, the skin, and the yummy part (I couldn't think of its name).  Some parts we eat (and we did eat), some parts we don't.  

We played with the seeds while we ate the apple - we counted them and arranged them in different shapes.  And we sang the song "Ohhhhhhhhhh the Lord is good to me, and so I thank the Lord, for giving me the things I need - the sun and the rain and the apple seed.  The Lord is good to me...."

I took red construction paper and cut out some circles to make paper apples.  We made a construction-paper apple tree with brown and green paper, and she taped the pieces (with some help) to another sheet of paper, and then we put on the red apples.  We counted them, and we talked about picking apples from trees in the fall.  Because they were taped to the picture and not glued or anything permanent, we could take them off and put them back on the paper easily, so we could "pick" the apples from the tree, or they could "faaaaaallllllll down."

We taped the real apple seeds to the construction-paper apples on our construction-paper tree.  We made other similar-sized red circles from the construction paper and then taped those circles on top of the ones with the seeds on them, making 3D apples.  So the seeds were hidden, just like in real apples.   

Using the construction paper, I cut out a little red capitol 'A' and a lower case 'a'.  What letter is this?, I asked, and she said, "A!"  What does it say?  She identified the sound, and we connected the sound with the word "apple."  Then we taped the a's on the picture.  It's always good to review that stuff.

Somewhere in there I told her the story of Johnny Appleseed.

Then we finished and ate some more apples for snack time.

Numbers 11-20

So we continue to work on numbers 11-20, but it has been hit or miss.  So today I took a new approach, the way she learned the letters - we focused on just two of the numbers.  We did the numbers 12 and 13.  (I picked 12 because when I showed her the 2, she said, 'That's not 12!" So I figured she was ripe for 12).  I made a card with the number 2 on it and one with the number 12 on it, and then I played a game of "shuffling" them behind my back, putting them in front of her, and asking, "Which is the number 12?"  and/or "Which is the number 2?"  Once she had done that correctly a number of times, we added two more cards, with the numbers 3 and 13.  She started getting bored and wanting to play with her Elmo, and so we taught Elmo about the numbers, which she really got into.  I think this approach might have worked better, although she was still misidentifying 3 vs 13 at the end.

Recognizing 11-20

I taught my daughter to count 1-20 using the Signing Time Counting Time DVD, and the we solidified it by counting as we would swing at the park.  And she learned to recognize visually the numbers 1-10 using her little number board books.  But for the longest time I couldn't figure out a way to get her to recognize 11-20.  Nothing I tried worked.  But this past week I had a breakthrough.  Not that the idea was incredibly brilliant - it is kind of mundane actually - but I was startled at how well it worked.

I cut a few regular sheets of computer paper into small flash card size rectangles.  Then I got out her little colored pencils.  She would choose a color and hand me the pencil, and I would write a number on one of the rectangles.  We did them in order, 1-20.  She paid almost no attention to the numbers as I wrote them after awhile, and she got bored half way through it (which has been the problem - her attention span won't last past 10).  

BUT, then we put TAPE (and she helped) on the back of the rectangle with the number 1 on it, and we taped it to her chest of drawers.  Then we put tape on number 2, and put it next to number 1.  After around number 10, she started rocking her teddy bear.  So I suggested letting the teddy bear put the number 11 up on the chest of drawers.  She thought that was a fun idea, and so she helped her teddy bear do it.  We put the 11 directly under the number 1, and I showed her again "11 is a one with a one in front of it."  Then teddy bear put up number 12 under number 2, and I showed her "12 is a two with a one in front of it."  I pointed the teddy bear's paw - "2" and "12," "2" and "12," "2" and "12."  My daughter's little head bobbed up and down as she followed the paw - it was adorable.  This worked all the way through 18, by which time she was rocking the teddy bear again.

I didn't know whether or not she had understood what we did.  She went back to the numbers again after a little while and started ripping them off the chest.  But then - the magic of these moments! - she ran up to me with a little rectangle, saying, "Mommy!  14 fell down!"  And sure enough, there in her hand was "14."  =)  

Bible Chapter Counting

As my daughter was waking up from her nap today, she noticed my Bible.  We opened it and she immediately pointed to the large number 2 marking a chapter number in Isaiah.  She exclaimed, "Two!"  That started our Bible chapter counting.  We went back to chapter 1 and counted along with the big numbers that marked the chapters (the little numbers that marked the verses were apparently too tiny to catch her interest).   It had never occurred to me to do this before, but it ended up being a really great activity.  We got to practiced counting, recognizing numbers, and we got to familiarize her with a little piece of the way the Bible works.

Pillow Shapes

One of my daughter's favorite games we use for reviewing shapes is the pillow shapes game.  We arrange 4 square pillows so that their corners are touching, counting 1, 2, 3, 4, and then - Look! Together their inside sides form the shape of a square!  We do the same thing with 3 pillows, and - Look! They make a triangle!   If you take 2 square pillows and 2 rectangle pillows and put their corners together - A rectangle!  We have fun jumping on the pillows, throwing them in the air and letting them land on our heads, and singing our shapes songs during this activity, as well.  Tons of fun.

Homemade Counting Toys

There are tons of counting toys I could buy, and we have a few.  But as interesting as they are at first, they lose their magic after awhile, and so it creates this endless cycle of always having to buy more toys.  Since one of the things I want most is activities I can do with my toddler, and since it is less expensive and less wasteful just to use things around the house in a new way, I decided to come up with a way to create new counting toys for my toddler.  This is what we did today, and I'll record some of my other ideas, too.

I used a teaspoon as the "stick."  I used construction paper to make some little "rings," which became the counting objects.   My toddler's job in making it with me was to press really hard when I put the scotch tape on the paper to make them stay as rings.  We counted them as we put the rings on the spoon, and then as we put the rings on her fingers (her idea! - it was so much fun).  This was fabulous for developing her fine motor skills.  Most of her store-bought ring toys are wood or plastic and relatively big and sturdy.  Small, flimsy paper rings were much more difficult for her, and so it took more effort.

Other ideas for sticks:  

1.  Stick from the backyard and pasta (Mezzi Rigatoni worked really well - I found it at the store - it's a good size).  I could just use one stick and let pasta slide down it, counting as we go.  More complex, I thought about taking 2 or 3 sticks of differing lengths and then using string or something to attach them parallel to one another to a perpendicular 4th stick, which would be the base.   Then we could work on concepts like, different length sticks hold a different number of pasta pieces.   (This worked great!  For some reason my computer won't let me put a picture of it here, but you can do it really simply.  We started with just one long, thin stick and let pasta sliiiiiiiiiiiide down it, counting as we went.) 

2.  Yarn and pasta.  To keep the pasta from falling all the way off the yarn when it slides down, I could maybe tie it to something, like one of her sand buckets.  Oh, good idea!!!  And then when we're done with the counting, we can swing the bucket, she can kick the bucket while I hold the string, we can jump over the string, we can dress the bucket up like (or just pretend) it is a dog and run around with it going "rough! rough! rough!"  (This one didn't work so well as far as counting went.  But we had a TON of fun playing with the yarn and bucket.  I wrote about it in the Sand Bucket Pendulum post, and there is a picture there.  Seriously, this is her favorite toy in our house now.)

Other suggestions welcome!

Tunnels and Balls: Motor Development and Counting

We have endless fun working on coordination, motor skills, and counting using tunnels and balls.  This has been a great way to burn energy on a cold or rainy inside-day.  We have several variations on the same theme.  Here is the gist - I lay out a tunnel placing 2 rows of blocks side-by-side.  As I put them in place, I count 1,2-3,4-5,6-etc.  Then we gather a ball or 2 (or 3) and roll it through the tunnel back and forth.  Then we kick it through the tunnel, throw it through the tunnel, run with it through the tunnel, jump with it through the tunnel, etc.  

One of the neat things about working with my daughter at this age is that she naturally takes the role of a co-creator with regard to our activity as her attention wanes every few minutes.  Today, while we were playing this game, we ended up doing these other things as well as we sort of naturally flowed with her attention and interest:

1.  I placed empty plastic water bottles at the end of the tunnel and used them like bowling pins.  We would kick, throw, and roll the ball through the tunnel to knock them over.  It took a little while for her to get the gist of this - at first she just carried the ball over to the "pins" and knocked them down directly.  But as she watched me she figured out my suggestion and ended up getting into it.  I was super impressed, too, as I watched her develop from knocking down the pins directly to kicking one ball to knock down one pin and then another ball to knock down the pin beside it!  

2.  We moved the rows of blocks together so that they formed a balance-beam-like row.  I walked along it, and she thought that looked like fun, and so she walked along it, too.  Obviously, I held her hand because the "beam" was unsteady and I didn't want her to sprain her ankle or something.  But she did really well with it and walked the beam over and over and over...

3.  She got out a flash light, and so we turned it on, shined it on the floor, and the light on the floor became the "ball!"  I moved the light down the (reconstructed) tunnel to the water bottles and shook the light over the bottles like I was knocking them down.  She thought this was hilarious.  The I had her "kick" the light and we did the same thing, "knocking down" the bottles.  

She also dressed up the ball (and then later the light on the floor) with her hair band, moved the blocks around some, and practiced attempting to sit her doll upon one of the tall, skinny blocks standing upright (that one didn't quite work).  The whole thing was tons of fun.

Pillow Counting

This is one of my daughter's favorite counting games.  I put 4 pillows on the floor in a circle and I put my daughter in the middle.  I say, "Where is your finger?"  We show each other our fingers, and then I say, "Let's count the pillows with our fingers."  We count 1-2-3-4.  Then we count the pillows with our noses (she thinks that is really silly), our whole hands, our heads, and our toes. Then, to count with our feet, I help her "jump" from pillow to pillow, counting 1-2-3-4 round and round the circle.  When we're done with that, I put her in the middle again, kind of laying her down, and do 1-2-3-4 TICKLE!  I use her hands (right hand for the pillows on her right and left hand for the ones on the left) and her feet to count, and then I say Tickle! and tickle her tummy with my nose.  She loves it.