More about money - pennies and nickels

The boys have been learning more and more about money. We have covered nickels and dimes. They have been a bit confused about the relationship between all the coins so we are trying to come up with new activities that would help them solve the confusion.

Here we put together a sheet with pictures and prices and gave the kids bowl with pennies and nickels. 

 

The goal was to build the prices using different coins. In how many ways can you make 18 cents? Another fun activity was - "Buy something for your sister" or "Pick what daddy would like". They love to hide it and surprise me.

 

This has been a winner with the boys so we made some more for nickels and quarters as well.

Subtraction plates

Learning the Montessori way is really fun! 

We are starting on subtractions and the kids are doing really good. One way that helped us achieve that is this fun activity with paper plates and rocks. I used space rocks because of our Space themed science unit but you can use really anything that you normally use as a counting prop (buttons, beads, glass rocks, M&Ms, etc)

 

It's easy - you just write the subtraction problem on a paper plate using sharpie and give the kids some rocks.  To help them figure this out, I told them to start with the higher number and put that many rocks on a plate. Minus means to take away, therefor they would have to take away from the higher number the smaller number. How many rocks are left?

Learning about money - pennies

We finally got to the topic of money! We were trying to find the best way to introduce the kids to the coins, what the names mean and how the amounts relate to each other. Last year we sort of kicked this off with our chore chart system. The kids each had a list of chores for each day. If they did 5 or more, they would get a quarter. if they did less than 5 they would not get anything. They each were saving for a toy, but not until they had enough to give 10% to God, and 10% into their savings. It all worked out pretty well and it helped them learn that there is a work that needs to be done, not only by mom or dad but that they can also contribute. This is how they learned the coin names.

Now it was time to teach them the next step. We decided to order a workbook that would go with this topic and after some research I went with the series that I always find the most helpful and that is the Kumon workbooks. Click here for the link to the Amazon page for the one we use. If your child is advanced in money counting, this might be boring for him/her. They ask same questions over and over but I like that because when we are just starting, the kids need to feel comfortable in order to move to the next step.

After we learned about pennies, I put together a store to enforce the subject in everyday life eperience, such as going shopping. We have this great cashier that came with pretend money. However I use the real thing while we learn and we just make sure to wash our hands.

 

I marked simple items with the price and gave the kids 20 cents. They had to decide if they had enough money to buy certain objects.

 

 I happened to take pictures of the objects with the same price, oops. But other things cost 5 cents or more. I also had 26 cents which they couldn't afford. It was a great problem solving situation and it enforced the money subject in a fun way!

Come back for some more posts coming up about fun ways to learn about money!

Which number is bigger?

A fun way to teach the little kids which number is bigger, is using some counting props and a chalkboard instead of a paper.

We chose to write some smaller numbers on chalkboard and demonstrate how the signs work.  

In order for the kids to make the connection between the two amounts, you can use some counting props that you have at your house (we have counting teddy bears). After they build their numbers with the props, they will easily see what the difference between those two amounts is.

As for the signs, you can say that the shark is going to eat the bigger amount (therefor the bigger number) and that is why the wider side is pointing towards the higher amount... the shark is trying to get it! We hope this helped :-)

Addition by 2

This activity could be used for any addition but we are continuing with number 2 right now. The boys are very comfortable counting it in their head by the end of the week, it's amazing!

 Take two dice. Leave one sitting untouched on the particular number you are using to add (in our case #2) and throw the other dice.

 

Then add both numbers. To make it more fun we used blackboard this time. The boys like to erase and rewrite, which is fine with me because it helps them practice number writing. You can also use a regular paper or erasable board.

Skip counting by 5s using hand prints

Another way to practice counting by 5s (or 10s as well) is using these hand prints we created. They are available for you to download for free by clicking here. You can print them on card stock or regular paper and laminate.

Here is how we used them:

We had the sticky notes up in our reading room. The boys laid out their hand prints in front of the sticky notes and practiced counting by 5s while looking at the sticky notes. When they felt comfortable enough they stopped looking at the sticky notes. 

I also had them jump from card to card while counting out loud.

 

 Here is another way these hand prints can be used. Have the kids lay them out in front of them and give them some snap blocks and have them build towers using five of the blocks.

Here is what they will end up with. Have them count by fives. 5 fingers equals 5 blocks. If they need explanation, you can use the blocks to count 5+5 = 10... if you add 5 you will end up with 10 blocks/fingers. That is why 5 is followed by 10 in skip counting by 5s. Have fun!

Making pattern using nails

Little kids are working mainly on numbers these days but we are trying to include some other material into their curriculum to refresh their skills. One of them is pattern. This week is the letter N on our schedule so we called these pegs "nails" and created a pattern using the different colors and the wooden board. This is a Montessori style activity.

Learning to read double digit numbers

I was trying to help the boys get more comfortable with reading higher numbers. I noticed that they sometimes read the numbers the other way around and sometimes they are off completely. Here are few ideas that should make it more fun for them to learn!

Plastic cups number reading

 I found this idea here. Go ahead and buy fun plastic cups (these were in Walgreens for a dollar). Then using a permanent marker, write numbers from 0-9 on each of them, the way you see it below. Now you are ready to teach the kids numbers 0-99.

Some ways we used them were:
- I told them a number and they had to find it
- I told them a number, they found it, and then they had to read every number they created after the number
- They asked me to find a number
- Randomly spin the cups and read the number that you see
- I asked them to find a number that is before a number... in this picture below it would be "Find me a number that is before the number 91". Answer would be 80.

Read me all the matching numbers.

We got the original idea from this great blog.

 

Another cute idea for number reading is this chart. This is really fun. However if your child doesn't have that much patience, you can divide this activity into several days, according to the colors or rows. We got the idea from this creative blog, where you can download different designs for free! We love people who like to share :-) Thank you!

Counting spiders - fine motor skills activity

The little kids are learning to count till 20. To make this fun, I found some glow in the dark Halloween spiders in Walgreens and I counted 15 of them. I put them in our workbox together with a small pumpkin purse and plastic tweezers. This is a great activity for eye hand coordination and it exercises those fine motor skills.

Simply have the kids transfer the spiders into the purse using the tweezers while counting out loud.

Thank you for stopping by!

Skip counting using sticky notes

This is a fast and fun idea to use while teaching skip counting. Get a stack of multicolored sticky notes and a poster board. Use one color for the numbers that you are skipping therefor that you don't see, and use the other color for the numbers that you are actually saying out loud. We are skip counting by twos all the way till 20 so it all worked out nicely in two rows of 10 notes - 5 being invisible numbers and 5 visible.

I use this method for practicing skip counting after I already explained it to them and read them some books on that topic. 

 

We used the same activity for skip counting by 5s and 10s. I had the kids switch the sticky notes themselves and they LOVED that! We didn't only say the numbers out loud, I also removed one of the numbers and they had to figure out which one was missing by repeating the skip counting in their head. We also stood up, faced the numbers, and read them out loud while jumping. For more advanced, you can turn around and say them without looking (watch for the mirror on the opposite wall, that I forgot about but the boys didn't :-D ). Have fun skip counting!

Skip counting socks

 We used this activity while we were learning skip counting by two. I started by explaining to the boys that skip counting by two is like counting pairs of something. Ask how many feet they have? How many hands or eyes? Tell them that having two of something means you have a pair - pair of hands or pair of eyes. We tried to find other pairs around us (shoes, ears, knees...) And that is when I pulled out the socks! We are counting till 20 so I had 10 pairs of socks for them to hang on the clothes line.

Everytime they pined a pair to the line, they would skip count from the beginning all the way to the one they just pinned.

 

They thought this was such a funny idea ;-)

Skip counting by 2's

We kicked off the school year with skip counting by 2's. Here is a little activity to help the kids to get familiar with the new way of counting.

Use permanent marker to write the numbers on the bottom of an egg carton. The little kids are learning letter M this week so we used M&Ms for this activity, but you can use rocks, marbles or any other similar object you have around your house.

Have the kids place two objects in each spot and have them skip count while doing it.

When they finished, we emptied the egg carton and did it again. This time, when they filled the spot, they started skip counting from the beginning only to the last filled spot. And when they filled the next spot, they started counting again.

 At the end they all got a little M&M treat!

Jelly Bean math

Including some sweet props into our daily learning always motivates the kids. Letter J is for jelly beans and so they found their way into our math today. 

We were focusing on learning how to count till five and we included some color sorting in this activity as well.
You can download free copy here.

It is also very good for the kids to pick up small objects such as jelly beans in order to exercise their fine motor skills!

Another free download you can get here is a "J is for Jelly Bean" counting puzzle. Simply print it out, cut up the paper on the marked lines, and if you wish you can laminate it. Printing it on card stock paper also works great.

Mix the strips up and have the kids put them in order creating a picture. The kids should say the numbers out loud. 

LEGO addition

Our boys like to build and LEGO is a big hit. So I had an idea to incorporate LEGO blocks into our math lessons. 

For this LEGO addition activity, you can just handwrite plus sign and equals sign on a white paper, give them some LEGO blocks and let them build their own equations.

Make sure you choose blocks that are suitable for the level your kids are comfortable with. If you give them bigger blocks, the addition will end up go over 10. But if you kids are advanced, give them higher numbers!

Have fun!

Easter eggs numbers addition and number recognition

We are in the Easter mood around here and so we are trying incorporate the excitement into our learning. 

In this math activity we used plastic Easter eggs, Jelly Beans, eraser board and erasable markers.

I filled up the plastic eggs with random amount of jelly beans and placed them into our math workbox. 

The boys had to open two eggs at a time, write the amount of the first one, write the plus sign and then write the second number... trying to keep the numbers on the red line. Then they had to add the amounts and write the result. 

Are you asking if they got to eat their props? Of course they did, but not till all their problems were finished ;-)

I love activities that get to be put together in just a short time with things you can find around the house. 

...and look what we did for the little preschoolers:

Number Recognition

Fill up the Easter eggs with Jelly beans so that each of them has the same amount of the jelly beans as it is written on each nota card.

Have the kids line up the card in the right numeric order first. Then have them open one egg at a time and have them place the jelly beans on the correct note card with the same number as the amount of jelly beans they opened.

This is how it should look when finished.

Have fun! 

Easter egg pattern

I picked these Easter eggs in the dollar store knowing that we can put them to some good use! I thought the preschoolers are ready to learn some serious pattern making. We gave them each two different egg colors. 

To help them figure out the point of pattern making, put few eggs in a row in the desired pattern. Say the colors out loud and let them tell you, which color comes next.

Let them possibly put some more in by themselves...

Jelly Bean Math

With the Easter Holidays just around the corner, I wanted to put a little sweet twist to our usual number grid exercise! We like to visit the dollar store for some inexpensive teaching props. And that is where we got these cute little spring paper baskets. I filled them up with some jelly beans and made a new looking math grid. 

I wrote numbers 1-10 on top of the paper (1-5 for the little ones) and drew some circles under it (10 circle under each number).

The kids then had to fill the empty circles with the right number of jelly beans!

They had lots of fun completing this exercise and what a motivation when they knew they can have a treat after they finish!!!

Math number grids - free download

Math grids are another fun way to learn number recognition as well as number order while having fun! 

I created two different math grids

First one shows numbers from 1 to 10.  
Click here for a free download of the worksheet 
This one is meant for the older preschoolers. 

The older kids used a "dot a dot" paint to fill in the empty spaces.

The second one is numbers 1 to 5.
Click here for a free download of the worksheet
This one is for the younger preschoolers 

(we have 2 year old and 3 year old working on those), 

whose attention spam doesn't last too long.

Since this was completed during our St. Patrick's Day party, 

we had the little kids use shamrock stamp to fill on the empty spaces. Feel free to use any stamps, or just simply have the kids color them in.