Counting Numbers 0 to 9

Mavi is 36 months old.

(September 26, 2011)

We’re back in practicing serious counting and number identification. 

The activity let the child learns numerals, amounts and how to match amounts with numerals (1:1 correspondence).

I am using the “identification-recognition-recall” mechanics of Montessori which is known as the 3-lesson period.  This site gives a clear explanation of how this 3-lesson period works.

Working with Numbers 0 to 4.

We started with play coins. 

I let him identify the numerals first, and I would say “let’s put the x(representing the numeral) number of coins in the grid”.  As I place the coin/s in the grid, I let my son count with me.

After I have placed the coins from 1 to 4, I would ask him “where is 3? where is the 0?” .  Then to end our 3-lesson period, we recalled each number of coins in the activity. 

My son participated well in this activity.  I was surprise that he’s beginning to have longer attention span.  After my presentation I let him do the activity by himself:  he placed the correct number of coins according to the number it represented.

Since he wanted to do more, we did other variations by using two more objects:  the beads and the popsicle sticks.

Basically, we just performed the same 3-lesson period as we did previously with the coins.

He’s always in deep concentration when he works.  I grabbed the opportunity to take photos while he’s busy.

This is how it looks using colored popsicle sticks.

 

Working with Numbers 5 to 9

 

Similar procedure on what we did with numbers 0 to 4, we practiced counting 5 to 9 as well.

That’s Mavi placing the appropriate number of coins to the grid.

He did very well with the beads :)  (Our 8 aka brown beads is a little shorter because it is made of smaller beads.  I didn’t find any brown beads of the same size as the rest)

Counting popsicle sticks. It came to a point where the sticks won’t fit on the space allotted to number six so he placed the rest below number 7 hehe. 

You can vary different objects or counters for this activity. Lakeshore Learning has a wide variety of math counters, but I find them quite pricey.  My playmoney is around 60PHP which I got from a thrift shop in Singapore as well as the craft popsicle sticks.  You can also you use erasers, cupcake topping designs, pebbles, flat marbles and much much more!

Phonics Search and Sort

We did Alpha Phonics Object box this week.  And for this activity, I just dumped everything (objects) on a box and had my son search for the objects that starts with letters R-A-M-F-B-I-T-G and sort them.

I love how he concentrates on this.

Here’s our object box.  I like it that I made it this way, mix everything and allow him to search.  It’s like playing a treasure hunt!

 

For the sorting, I placed four different colored construction papers on the table and made him arrange the uppercase and lowercase “ramf” letters.

The result of his work: 

      

After “ramf”, he asked if we could do more.  So I made him search for objects starting with letters “bitg”.

      

This is what my son came up with letters “bitg”.

      

B4FIAR: We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen

Mavi is 36 months old.

My son picked We’re Going on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen as our next unit for B4FIAR.  And since I realized that the subject here is on bears, I find it wise to row Blueberries for Sal at the same time.  So we’ve been reading these books everyday, and singing Rosen’s bear hunt song at the same time.  But the focus of this week’s activities is on We’re Going on a Bear Hunt.

STORY SEQUENCING.

A wonderful activity that we truly enjoyed.  Read about it here.

Then we further explored the book by doing our very own bear hunt activity.  I posted it here.

 

MATH.  We did two versions of bear counting. The first was inspired by this post.  I love how they practiced counting and color sorting at the same time.

Then we also had our version of cards and counters (bears) but instead of using a number symbol, I used a hand symbol to indicate the number of bears to be counted.  Surprisingly, my son can recognize what number the hand signifies by just looking at it :)

 

I also made some pattern matching printables to go with our unit study.  Here, Mavi has to matched the patterns.

We studied animal tracks and played the matching game.  I got the file that I printed out from here.

I wanted to demonstrate what is animal track and how they differ from one another so I made use of our playdough and some of his animal figures for this.   Happily, each animal figures produced different tracks.

He enjoyed making tracks and this animal track activities.  He keeps asking for it for several days.

LANGUAGE.

Using the B4FIAR packs I downloaded from Homeschool Creations, we build, spell and read words

He easily build the word “mud”.

But with words with composed of more than 5 letters, he would at times miss the correct order of the letters.

Then there’s the clipcards for practicing beginning letter sounds.

 

SCIENCE.

The subject for this unit is bear, so I was happy to get hold of the brown bear book from our library.  It basically consist of everything that you need to know about this massive creature.  This book was very informative.  It first started describing the different parts of the bear, then goes to describe the bear habitat and youngs, how they search for their food, how they sleep and how they play. 

I looovee this book.  It has wonderful pictures that my son can clearly visualize what a real bear looks like.  I hope I own the whole series.

I downloaded worksheets from Kidzone and First School for our bear study and writing practice.

PRACTICAL LIFE.

We did a bunch of cutting activities.  I made use of our old magazines instead of printing a cutting strip. 

First, I made a guide for him to cut that is by marking the borders of the picture in the magazine as shown above.  Then he has to cut the picture using that guide.  So far, he liked this idea of cutting magazines and with lines.

Then he asked to cut more.  And told me that he wants to make the guide this time.

Mavi tracing the brown the bear.  He didn’t color it though.

The worksheet from First School.

Working on the pre-writing sheets that comes with the pack.

          

PLAY PRETEND.

He wanted to experience being  a bear. So I made him claws which he really really love!  Then he looked at the picture of the brown bear from this book and told me he should also have a brown face, so I made him a brown mask as well.

Well I just thought that these pictures were so funny.  He tried to growl like the bear and keep roaming around the house scaring me and his Dad :) Precious.

And that’s what we did for our We’re Going on a Bear Hunt unit.  Hope it inspire and entertained you :)

B4FIAR: Bear Hunt Story Sequencing

It took my son weeks to get over the We’re Going on a Bear Hunt book.  He love it even more when he saw Michael Rosen’s video version. He’s been singing it 24/7! The very first thing that we did for the B4FIAR unit was to sequence the story in the book. 

First we read the book together.  Then we read it the second time, but as we do I would pause and ask him what was the first thing that the family encountered as they hunt for the bear, then what happened next and so on. My son would get confused between the mud, forest and snowstorm, but he can clearly describe each event.  Say, instead of saying ‘mud’, he’ll give me the “thick oozy mud”. 

 

Surprisingly, he can match the description with the picture.  But of course, we’ve been doing this activity for quite sometime now and he must have memorize it already.

The second time we did the activity (he asked for it!), I made each picture an a object to make it more “realistic”.  As seen on the pictures below, I made a grass, river, mud and cave out of construction paper.  The snowstorm, I added bits of styrofoam on the picture representing snow and for the forest, I made trees out of pipe-cleaners and construction papers.

      

Boy oh boy! He looooveed this bear hunt world!

And I was really touched when he told me that there should be a family.  He said "Mama, where’s the family?”  So I made him a picture of a family.  In the picture I was the only one who’s not wearing a hat, so he insisted that I should also wear a hat.  I told him I cannot wear a hat, but he want it so badly that he added a hat on my picture, as you can see below.

                        

And he positioned everything, including our miniature bear.  Oh he was so delighted!

That night, he displayed his work on the window to preserve it for his Daddy to see.

I will be posting more bear hunt activities.  So stay tuned! 

P.S.  I do not own these printables.  I’ve downloaded this story sequence printable a long long time ago and I forgot the source.  If ever you own this or came across the source, please do let me so I can add credits to this post.

B4FIAR: Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina (Part 2)

Mavi is 36 months old.

As a continuation of our B4FIAR for Caps for Sale, we did crafts, math and science after our language lessons . For math, I relied on the the packs which I downloaded from the site I mentioned in my pervious post.  Then I added some patterning activities using homemade materials.

ARTS AND CRAFTS.  We did tree painting and attempted to put monkeys on it too!  During our activity, I showed him how to create a simple tree using brown color for trunks and branches, and green for leaves.  As we go along, I would describe how I execute my strokes.  After which, I encouraged him to do the same.

                                    

But he was eager to do something different using his fingers.  Picture above is showing my son making a turtle hehe.

Below is a painting of my son’s version of a tree.  He did the trunk and branches and put a small amount of leaves on it.  Then I finished his work by adding more leaves.

MATH.  We read the book once again and while doing so, I made him arrange the caps according to the color that was mentioned on the book.  Again, the file was from the B4FIAR packs of Homeschool Creations (see previous post for the link).

        

Then I introduced the concept of patterns.  This is something new for him as he wasn’t interested with patterning before.  And I was surprise that he liked our matching activity this time and even asked for more!  All pattern materials are homemade (you can send me a PM if you want the file).   The graphics in the pattern file were just taken randomly via Google image.

Here, we did a pattern match.  So happy that he finished this activity in a minute.  But I was kind of disappointed that it didn’t challenged him a bit.

Next we did some “follow the patterns” activity. He was very keen on how he will position the patterns and made sure that he gets them right.

      

Below is a coin counting activity that my son enjoyed the most. To make it more “Montessorish”, I made him use some play coins for counting.  So instead of him counting the ones on the card, he counts as he places a coin on top of the picture on the card.  We use a wooden peg which I bought at a craft store nearby.

      

SCIENCE: PARTS OF A TREE

These activities were not supposed to be part of our B4FIAR.  I was preparing this for our “trees” theme activities  but decided to add it to our B4FIAR curriculum because a “big tree” is mentioned on the book.

So here’s what I came up... a tree puzzle made from felt sheets.  Totally forgot where I got the pattern... promise to add a link once I find the source.  I put labels so my son can familiarize himself with the different parts of the trees.

 

Mavi was very very excited for this material.  He loves puzzles and he kept asking me if he can do the puzzle all by himself.  See how he position the branches :)

     

We made use of the 3-part nomenclature card (homemade) for parts of the trees.

Inspired by this post, I made a matching game of tree shapes.  The graphics were all sourced from the internet randomly.

      

And here, we further discussed the parts of a tree by doing paper crafts.

 

Well there you go... our very own B4FIAR for Caps for Sale.  To end this post... here’s my little one pretending to be the peddler and balancing a throw pillow on his head :)