Demonstrate beginning understanding of numbers, number names, and numerals.
In this lesson, children will use objects, pictures and numbers to play out scenarios that involve addition and subtraction.
In this lesson, children will count the correct number of apples to match the numerals on the tree trunks.
In this lesson, children will begin to develop an understanding of separating a set into a maximum of four parts.
In this lesson, children will sort loop cereal such as Fruit Cheerios or Fruit Loops by color and then make patterned bracelets.
In this lesson, children will use the number of letters that they have in their names to count and graph and then compare and contrast.
In this lesson, children will roll dice to determine the number of circles and then the numbers of bears in those circles. After collecting that data, they will determine how many groups of bears they have for a total number of bears.
In this lesson, children will examine the attributes of coins to identify similarities and differences.
In this lesson, children will count by ones using counters to match the roll of a die.
In this board game, children collect dinosaurs of different colors as they count their way around the board.
In this lesson, children will explore the concept of addition by counting the dots on a domino.
In this lesson, children will be introduced to a variety of beginning math concepts using dominoes.
In this lesson, children will trace their own hands and estimate how many Fruit Loops it will take to the tracings.
In this lesson, children will practice counting and number recognition using numbers one thru twelve, an egg carton and small manipulatives such as pebbles.
In this lesson, children will create and record the fractions for each color of their caterpillar using colored pompoms.
In this lesson, children will correctly count the number of objects representing the number on a card.
In this lesson, children will count the marshmallows in their hot chocolate and write the number on their hot chocolate mugs.
In this lesson, children will string the correct number of beads onto pipe cleaners. The number of beads will correspond with the number on the label at the top of each pipe cleaner.
In this lesson, children will determine if a number is greater than, less than or equal to another.
In this lesson, children will estimate and then measure how many beans fit in the giant’s hand and compare it to how many beans fit in their own hands.
In this lesson, children will practice counting and adding whole numbers using LEGO blocks.
In this lesson, children will sort, classify and count by ones to determine “how many?”
In this lesson, children will match cards that display numbers with cards that display groups of objects that represent those numbers.
In this lesson, children will assemble a puzzle using number strips in the order of 1-10.
In this lesson, children will create their own number yard books by drawing the number of objects that correspond with the numbers on the pages of the book.
In this lesson, children will differentiate between odd and even numbers by sorting numbers 1-20 into “Odd” or “Even” circles.
In this lesson, children will follow the eating patterns of the hungry caterpillar and sort the caterpillar’s snacks according to the sequence in which they are eaten.
In this lesson, children will use rocks numbered from one to 10 to practice sequencing skills.
In this lesson, children will identify parts of a whole and create pictures using a whole circle, a half circle, a quarter circle and an eighth of a circle.
In this lesson, children will arrange them 25 cubes into groups of two, three, four and five. The children will examine the different groups and learn about the concept of a remainder.
In this lesson, children will develop visual images for quantities up to six and begin to understand and apply basic concepts of probability using dice.
In this lesson, children will predict, sort, add and subtract the various animals that Rooster meets on his trip.
In this lesson, children will organize and present tally sticks/marks to represent the number counted.
In this lesson, children will orally count backwards from 10 to 1.
In this lesson, children will count the seeds by ones and twos and then put the packets in order from smallest to largest and vice versa.
In this lesson, children will practice sorting not-number cards from number cards and develop their number sense by identifying similar numbers, one below a number and one above a number.
In this lesson, children will use vehicle counters to recreate existing patterns and find the unknown within a pattern.
In this lesson, children will be able to recognize, sort and differentiate objects in groups of two, three and four.
In this lesson, children will count, compare, contrast and graph the number of letters in their names.
“Look!” squeals three-year-old Eleanor. “I can pick up these two balls! It’s magic!” Have you ever seen young children playing with magnets? The “magical” properties of magnets never fail to captivate early learners and spark a play buzz! Children learn by investigating, observing and figuring out how things work. Magnets fuel that curiosity in […]
“Look, look! Come and see what is inside this flower!” It’s a warm, late-spring day and our friends are scattered around the yard, discovering the new surprises that have popped up overnight. The flowers are finally showing their beautiful blooms! “Is it a bumblebee?” I ask. They look at me—their eyes big with wonder. […]
Rock balancing or CAIRNS has found its way into our play again this week! Stacking and balancing rocks encourages math and science investigations that are always developmentally appropriate. My adrenaline starts flowing and a smile grows on my face when a two-year-old child exhibits an innate sense of how to balance many more rocks […]
“I found an empty nest! Can we keep it?” Owen’s joyful discovery captures everyone’s attention. Three-year-old Avery comes running. “Are there eggs?” she asks her older and wiser five-year-old friend. “Can I see?” she begs. “Please let me see?” “There are no eggs, just an old nest. Can we please keep it?” pleads Owen. After […]
“I found GOLD!” squeals Laura. Four little friends are quick to join her in the latest gold rush in the sandbox. In the wee hours of the morning, often when the sun is barely above the horizon and the coffee is still being brewed, gold will magically appear in our sandbox. Spray-painted rocks that […]
One bright fall morning, I notice that the noise level at Under the Gingko Tree is exceptionally low. A quick glance around reassures me that all of my early learners are safe and accounted for. Then I notice a quiet but intense play buzz happening in our rain garden, so I wander over to […]
“Look! The snow packs! Let’s make a snowman!” Today’s sunshine and rising temperatures have transformed yesterday’s powdery snow into packable fun—ushering in an afternoon of playful math and science learning. These are the times when I love to pull out my camera to document the many foundation-building moments that find their way into our play. […]
“Do our shadows look like the monsters in the book?” asks James. I glance over and see James and Noa connecting their shadows by overlapping their arms. When we engage children in outdoor shadow play to support active exploration and discovery, their creativity is endless! James and Noa are playing out their version of […]
“AAAAUUUUGHHHHHHH! Worms! Look, look! They are everywhere!” Eleanor is jumping up and down hysterically. Nothing will bring our crew running faster than a good worm sighting! Let the earthworm exploration begin. We love worms! Last spring, we witnessed an unusual natural phenomenon as a mass of earthworms wiggled out of their subterranean homes in […]
“I see the daddy cardinal, do you know where the mama bird is?” Four-year-old Noah, binoculars in hand, is busy counting birds in our outdoor classroom. Are you aware that the annual Great Backyard Bird Count is coming up later this week? This is a great opportunity to create a bird-watching station and knock out […]
“Hey, Hudson! How did you do that?” Eleanor is amazed at Hudson’s success as he races a car down the ramp. This is the same car that she couldn’t get to stay on the ramp just minutes earlier. I listen as Hudson turns the car over and explains, “See those wheels? The front ones […]
I recently grabbed our dusty box of beanbags off of the top shelf of the closet and took the beanbags outside. We rarely played with them indoors, so what was I saving them for? If a beanbag gets lost or forgotten under the plants and soaked in the rain, who cares? At least it […]
Today’s dark skies and heavy rain have driven us indoors for what started out as a low-energy day. But now it’s even quieter—as in “too quiet.” I can feel my anxiety rising. But as I look around and see the children engaged in deep, calm block play—with wooden blocks strewn all over our classroom—I break […]
“I smell cinnamon rolls!” exclaims Henry as he races through the gate towards our outdoor classroom. Everyone stops what they are doing to inhale deeply. “I do too! I want a cinnamon roll!” pleads Noah. My group is quite disappointed to learn that I am not baking cinnamon rolls this morning. The delicious cinnamon-roll […]
“Hey everybody! Look at all of the tomatoes that are ripe today!” shouts Jacob to the gang. “Can we eat them for lunch? Can we?” asks Lucus. “Can we eat them now?” pleads Elizabeth. It’s early September and preschoolers around the country are learning about apples, but we have tomatoes at our fingertips. The same […]
“Hey, Evelyn! Go get your cell phone and meet me at the stumps!” calls Noa. My head whirls around as I check the classroom to see if a cell phone has actually made its way into school today. Then I see Evelyn running to the basket of dominoes to get her “cell phone.” Whew! […]
As the days grow shorter and the slanting rays of sun that create our rainbows are replaced by clouds, we shift our energy to other forms of investigative play with light and color. “Saaliha, come play with me at the light table!” Nora calls out. Saaliha joins her friend and the STEM investigations into […]
“LOOK! We have icicles!” “Can I have one? I need one!” On this brisk winter morning—much to the children’s delight—nature has given us the gift of icicles. The children’s fascination with these frozen treasures leads to an abundance of “teachable moments” as we engage in some STEM learning while getting some fresh air and exercise. Soon […]
“Can you read it again? PLEASE?” Frigid temps and gray days lead to lots of reading as we weather the winter season. As February unfolds, I am thrilled to present a series of STEM books guaranteed to educate, enrich and entertain early learners while the snow flies. It’s difficult to find books that balance exceptional […]
“Can we play with those counting things today?” Two bubbly three-year-olds are standing in front of me with expectant smiles on their faces. I have absolutely no idea what they talking about—or what’s going on in those busy little brains, which I can almost hear whirring with activity. “What counting things are you looking […]
“One, two, three, flip!” “I win!” shouts Matif. Remember playing War as a child? It’s simple and fun and it teaches young children how to win and lose without a lot of drama. I love playing cards with young children because that little deck helps foster the development of early math and social-emotional skills […]
“Five green and speckled frogs…sat on a speckled log…eating some delicious bugs. Yum yum! I hear a chorus of young voices singing in our outdoor classroom as three young friends hold hands and frolic around in a circle. When we sing counting songs such as “Five Green and Speckled Frogs” or “This Old Man,” […]
Whether you grew up with Schoolhouse Rock, Sesame Street, the Electric Company, Romper Room or Raffi, chances are good that you can still sing a counting song that you learned way back then. Ah, there are some really great songs from those days and many a Schoolhouse Rock version is being used to teach “skip counting” […]
We brought out the tape measurers this week. Ah, nothing like a tool in the hand of young friends to get the juices flowing and the neurons firing up! Playful math! Math that is done for no other purpose than the sheer joy and fun it brings. I don’t worry that they don’t understand the […]
“Five green and speckled frogs…sat on a speckled log…eating some delicious bugs. Yum yum!” I hear a chorus of voices singing in our outdoor classroom as three young friends hold hands and frolic around in a circle When we sing counting songs such as “Five Green and Speckled Frogs” or “This Old Man,” we […]
A pair of four-year-olds in my classroom are happily playing “dice wars,” a simple but fast-paced game. To play, each child rolls a die and the player who rolls the highest number wins. No one is keeping score today—and nobody seems to care who wins each round. I watch as Juan shakes the die between […]
“Fingers, fingers, 1-2-3…how many fingers do you see?” We are playing one of our favorite finger games. I hide one hand behind my back. When I bring it forward, I hold up some fingers and the children shout out the number of fingers that they see. “Three!” shout the friends playing the game. […]
“When we drive to school in the morning, the sunflowers are facing one way and when we drive home after school they are facing the other way. That’s because they always want to see where I am going!” brags Melania to the other children on the bus. “That’s not true,” grumbles Roberta, who is clearly […]
“I’ll carry the biggest container,” volunteers four-year-old Matthew as the younger children fall in behind him. Picking strawberries during the first week of summer break is an annual tradition in our early childhood program. What better way to learn about counting, measuring and estimating than to get out in the fresh air and sunshine and […]
“Hey! Let’s play Olympics! ” shouts four-year-old Carl. “We can have a relay race and use a paper towel tube for the relay baton. Who wants to play?” “Let’s do the long jump!” calls out Celia, who is already jumping up and down with excitement. A week of watching the Paris Olympic Summer […]
“Good night, Gorilla,” says four-year-old “zookeeper” Emma as she pats her friend, Ana, on the head. Emma pretends not to notice as Ana—playing the role of the gorilla in this reenactment of the beloved children’s book, Goodnight, Gorilla—removes a colorful set of keys from Emma’s pocket to unlock her pretend cage. (These toy keys […]
Last month, the City of Chicago and educators around the globe celebrated Ella Jenkins’s 100 birthday. If you grew up listening to borrowed albums, tapes, or CDs from your local library, I guarantee that Ella Jenkins has touched your life. If you’ve been to a state or national early learning conference, there is a […]