Kids Learning to Love Math

Simple Activities Done Together Counts

There are some simple math activities that families can do that are really cheap but effective. It is what families think, say, and do that counts, according to researchers. Remember the saying, “Children who are read to, read?” The same is true for math.  When you’re in the kitchen, car, restaurant, or park try these suggestions and see how easy they are to do. Math thinking becomes an enjoyable habit.

 Number Meaning

  Teach young children to make connections between numbers and sets of objects. Point to beans on their plate and ask,” How many beans to you see? Let’s count them.”  Showing children three Cheerios or toy cars when teaching the number three helps them understand what numbers mean better than reciting strings of numbers by memory. 

Make Connections Observe Patterns and Sets

 Shapes and Patterns

  Spot patterns in picture books like dots and lines on a character’s shirt. Build towers of blocks side by side and invite children to make theirs look like yours. Look for rectangles, circles and other shapes on the playground. What shapes are on houses and other buildings? What shapes can you find during a walk in the woods?  Use gestures and words to describe shapes and how they are bigger or smaller than other shapes. Use shapes to draw simple animals and other figures. 

Addition and Subtraction

  Draw a number line on the sidewalk, garage, or basement floor. Then hop on numbers, such as,” Hop to 5,” and now, “Hop to the number that is 1 more.” Piggy bank their money or use threejars.com to practice adding and subtracting when they want to use money.

Cooking with Fractions

  Use fractions to divide recipe ingredients while helping in the kitchen. “How many half cups make a whole cup? Help children cut pizzas, fruits, and vegetables into halves, fourths and thirds.

Problem Solving

Families Activities Can Teach Math

For families who want to jump into math problem solving there is There is a site that provides fun math problem from time to time to figure out.  Go to bedtimemathproblem.org. There are problems for wee ones, little kids, and big kids. Here’s a sample. Wee ones can count on fingers: If you rake up 2 bags of leaves and use a leaf blower to pile up 3 more bags of leaves, how many bags of leaves did you clean up? Then when outside raking leaves use the idea to talk about math.  “We raked up two piles of leaves. If we rake up two more, how many piles will we have to jump on?”  The same is true for making snowballs and snowmen. There is also “Bedtime Math: The Truth Comes Out” part of the Bedtime Math series by Laura Overdeck. Math conversation can be fun!

For more see grandparentsteachtoo.blogspot.com and wnmufm.org/Learning Through the Seasons live and podcasts; Pinterest, and Facebook.

Photos: Fran Darling, fdarling fotos 

Taking a Bus Trip

A city Bus Ride helps youngsters as they watch older children go to school and are sad to be left behind, or sometimes caregivers just need to get outside for daily activities, even in cold winter months. A city bus ride is inexpensive, makes children feel special, and can teach many skills.

Materials Needed:

 Bus schedule, city map, and change

What to do:

  In advance, call the bus station for the schedule, closest bus stop, cost, and rules for snacks. Many cities have all the information on-line. Public transportation is  a cheap way to explore.  Buses will often go by museums and other community stops, but you can ride just for the fun of it. Keep the trip short and give children the fare to pay themselves. Teach good bus safety habits like sitting and using a soft voice.

  Because objects might be zooming by, keep the activities simple.  Depending upon the children’s ages, search for objects of a certain color, count the number of white trucks, stop signs, traffic lights, or gas stations. Look for different shapes like squares, rectangles, rhombuses (diamonds), trapezoids, circles, octagons (stop signs) and triangles. You could also look for the alphabet.

   Teach simple economics by pointing out delivery trucks bringing goods to stores and people unloading boxes. Explain that it takes trucks, many people, and hard work to get food and merchandise in stores.

   Look for police cars, city workers, mail carriers, emergency vehicles, school buses, package delivery trucks, and explain what they are doing and that it takes many people working together to make a community.

  You can teach a little geography, too. Point out hills, rivers, highways, turns in the road, intersections, bridges, and other features. Use a route map to show children where you are and track your progress.

How will this help my child?

Children need carefree conversations that are more than directions to get dressed, eat their vegetables, brush their teeth, etc. These conversations with adults help build vocabulary to use in reading and writing.

  Conversation with young children takes a little practice, but it is absolutely essential for success in school. If adults ask children to look for things, listen for sounds, and describe what is going on, children will start asking questions and the conversation will flow.

What Other Activities Can We Do?

  Occasionally take the bus with young children to visit other places in your city like libraries, the credit union, bank, post office, museums, recycling center, public buildings, markets, religious buildings, and sport centers.

Illustration by: Mark Nowicki

For more winter activities to help your children succeed in school and have a life time of learning see the authors’ book Learning Through the Seasons in museums, bookstores, and in E-book form atSmashwords.com. 

Fun and Learning for Quiet Times

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 Vigorous physical activity is a big part of each day to keep young children healthy, but adults need to plan for quiet activities too.   While some limited TV time is OK, what are some other quiet easily managed activities you can set up?

 Listen to this activity online at the WNMU Podcasts

Materials Needed:  magazines, paper, crayons, markers, scissors, paint set, Q’tips, yarn, water, small rocks, white glue, 

What To Do:

Painting with Water

   Take a science walk and collect rocks of various colors, sizes, and shapes. At home, set your children up with a waterproof area and provide a small paintbrush or Q’tip and a bowl of water to help build up the small muscles of their hands. These muscles must be strong to print letters.  Show how to “paint” the rocks with water and notice how the color shows up like magic.  

 Pet Rocks 

   Help children use permanent markers to draw a face on the surface of favorite large rocks. Help them glue on a little yarn to make hair. Teach a dot of glue does a lot. Teachers will love you. Can you think of a good name for each? Place the rock on your table, desk, bookcase, or garden.

Crayon Resist

  Use a crayon on paper to carefully print your young children’s names in big letters.   Use a capital for the first letter and lower case for the following letters.  Then use water with a little paint color to make a wash over the whole sheet.  The name will stand out and be a perfect door decoration or book cover for a whole series of pictures. You can se dots or dashes to outline names. Show children how to start at the top of each letter to correctly follow the dots to print their names. Praise what they can do. They’ll try their best.

 Favorite Pictures  

  Using old grocery fliers and magazines, help children choose and cut out pictures of favorite flowers, fruits, animals, vegetables, and toys.  Print each blank paper with a picture title, for example:” My Favorite Fruits.”  Let the kids cut, sort and paste the pictures.  Talk with children about choices and use a marker to print the name of each item. This is a good activity to practice letters and beginning sounds of each word.  Very young children should work on only one category at a time. All these activities encourage creativity, build vocabulary and make the connection between reading and writing.

Reading

 The number one priority is reading, reading, and reading!  Read to children several times every day and visit the library to check out books and attend free library programs.

Photo: Norman, Steve. nat143.jpg. . Pics4Learning. 22 Dec 2012

 For more fall activities to help your children succeed in school and have a life time of learning see the authors’ book Learning Through the Seasons in museums, bookstores, and in E-book form atSmashwords.com.

Are We There, Yet?

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  How much longer before we get there?  How many more days before my birthday? How many piano practices this week? Young children often have a difficult time waiting because time can’t be touched, seen, heard, tasted, or smelled. Listen to this activity online at the WNMU Podcasts

Materials:

  Paper, crayons, and scissors

 What to do:

  Difficult concepts like time are much easier for children to understand when they are involved in discussing and crossing something off.  These ideas can also be used to help manage chores around the house, change habits and behavior, and traveling.

Traveling

  Children get impatient while traveling.  They want to be there NOW. Decide on a picture or symbol to represent a length of time. Children can prepare pictures of cars or airplanes representing each half hour before the trip. The drawings can be taped to a car window, placed in a backpack, and removed as each period passes. Then children can count how much time is left.

Special Events

  The time before holidays or family visits can seem endless for children. A week before an event, cut out symbols for the holiday and line them up on a window. Every morning children can take down one object and place it in a basket. Then count how many objects are left on the window.

    Families can help children put something up to mark time instead of taking one down. As an example, for Christmas you can create a paper tree for a window and place paper ornaments on the tree until the big day.

  If people are coming for a visit make a little calendar and X off the days. You can also draw faces representing the visitors and place them on a calendar.  This is also a good time to start learning days of the week, counting, and subtracting. Children learn more quickly when information is important to them.

Developing Habits

  Families can tape a calendar and list of three age appropriate chores to the refrigerator. They can add stickers when children complete assigned family chores or accomplish a task. Children may earn a special toy or money for being successful.  Every management plan becomes old and must be replaced or tweaked. Keep your plan and expectations realistic to your children’s ages. Praise even little successes. 

Photo: Christen, Blaine. dali.jpg. June 2008. Pics4Learning. 12 Dec 2012

--> For more fall activities to help your children succeed in school and have a life time of learning see the authors’ book Learning Through the Seasons in museums, bookstores, and in E-book form atSmashwords.com.

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