I'd been interested in incorporating a Hundreds Chart into play time with Will for quite a while. He's really good at reading and saying aloud two-digit numbers now and there's just SO MUCH you can do with these charts!
These first couple pictures and game are from the end of November. I figured an easy way to introduce the chart would be to practice place value and number sequencing. I have a bowl of buttons that the kids always like to play with so I used those as "markers" and covered up a bunch of random numbers. This is a pretty self-explanatory "game" so I set it up as shown for Craig and Will to play while I got dinner ready one night.
I gave them each a little dish and they took turns pointing to a button, saying aloud the number that they believed to be below it and then removing the button. If they got it right, they kept the button in their dish and that was their score. So for example, the large pink button towards the bottom middle has a 65 and a 67 on either side of it. And this was just a lesson for Will to recognize that 66 must fall between those two. He did very well and they played a couple times.
I gave them each a little dish and they took turns pointing to a button, saying aloud the number that they believed to be below it and then removing the button. If they got it right, they kept the button in their dish and that was their score. So for example, the large pink button towards the bottom middle has a 65 and a 67 on either side of it. And this was just a lesson for Will to recognize that 66 must fall between those two. He did very well and they played a couple times.
Here's a quick game that I made for Sophie sometime in December to practice counting (which she's great at) and 1:1 correspondence (which is pretty good but still needs practice). She's also able to look at a pair or a trio of something and be able to just say there are two or three items there (as opposed to physically counting them)... which I don't think Will was doing at this age.I cut a Christmas tree shape out of green felt and put it on a tray along with some red and green "ornaments" (pom poms). Then I'd trade out a number (from our number puzzle) on the tray and have her count that many ornaments onto the tree.
She did pretty well! And we'd always recount a couple of times after she was finished just to keep practicing.
After a bit, I thought to place the number on top the tree in lieu of a star. :)
She liked this game and we did it on several different days.
Ultimately, I was most excited to use the Hundreds Chart to introduce skip counting to Will. We'd had several impromptu conversations about even and odd numbers prior to this, which kind of sparked the interest in counting by 2's. I had some neat ideas for skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's that I wanted to show Will and I knew the Hundreds Chart would really help show the pattern and solidify the concept.
She did pretty well! And we'd always recount a couple of times after she was finished just to keep practicing.
After a bit, I thought to place the number on top the tree in lieu of a star. :)
She liked this game and we did it on several different days.
Ultimately, I was most excited to use the Hundreds Chart to introduce skip counting to Will. We'd had several impromptu conversations about even and odd numbers prior to this, which kind of sparked the interest in counting by 2's. I had some neat ideas for skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's that I wanted to show Will and I knew the Hundreds Chart would really help show the pattern and solidify the concept.We started one evening after bath time and I had him collect every pair of shoes that he owned into a bag and we brought them downstairs. Then he lined them up in pairs in one long row.
Next, I took squares of paper and we counted aloud and wrote the increasing total beside each pair of shoes. I think the sets of shoes really helped him recognize each pair as one unit. So we'd say aloud "2...+2 more = 4...+2 more = 6...+2 more = 8" etc.
Then he went through and said the numbers on our orange squares right down the row. I helped him recognize that we were counting "every other number" and "skipping one number in between".
In between each activity, we'd go back to the Hundreds Chart. I'd give him a dot stamper and he'd go through and stamp the numbers we were skip counting. This helped him see that in each row of 10, he was always stamping the numbers that ended in 2, 4, 6, 8 and 0... and then he could see the clear columns of orange stamps! We talked and counted aloud each time we did this.
And always at the end, we'd go through and count the stamped numbers aloud. Hearing the pattern is helpful too.
Next, I took squares of paper and we counted aloud and wrote the increasing total beside each pair of shoes. I think the sets of shoes really helped him recognize each pair as one unit. So we'd say aloud "2...+2 more = 4...+2 more = 6...+2 more = 8" etc.
Then he went through and said the numbers on our orange squares right down the row. I helped him recognize that we were counting "every other number" and "skipping one number in between".
In between each activity, we'd go back to the Hundreds Chart. I'd give him a dot stamper and he'd go through and stamp the numbers we were skip counting. This helped him see that in each row of 10, he was always stamping the numbers that ended in 2, 4, 6, 8 and 0... and then he could see the clear columns of orange stamps! We talked and counted aloud each time we did this.
And always at the end, we'd go through and count the stamped numbers aloud. Hearing the pattern is helpful too. Skip counting by 2's was pretty easy though he couldn't do it without a visual like the chart.
For 5's, I traced his hand 10 times onto paper. We acknowledged aloud that he had five fingers on each hand and that, in order to easily count all the fingers we'd drawn, we could count by 5's. This was much trickier than the 2's and, in reality, we had to count each finger individually as we were adding until we could easily see the pattern. So, in this case, having the visual of five fingers on a hand was not all that helpful.
On the other hand, seeing the Hundreds Chart and saying the pattern aloud was far easier than the 2's. I'm still glad we did the hand thing, because I want to present it to him from many angles so he knows they are all the same. But definitely counting aloud and looking at the chart were the most helpful with the 5's.
Skip counting by 10's was the probably the easiest and most fun, so we were able to do a little bit of an extension with this these. We started by making "10-bead chains" using pipe cleaners and pony beads. We made 10 of them - Will did five orange and I did five yellow.
This was a fine motor, counting exercise in itself!
I just bent and pinched the ends when we finished each chain. Easy and cheap.
When we finished, we again talked about how each chain represented "10" and discussed how each row on the Hundreds Chart had 10 numbers in it. So we placed a chain on each row and practiced saying aloud that "here's 10... and then if we add 10 more, that equals 20" etc.
He did go through and stamp the 10's, but this concept was already understood and probably unnecessary. Still, another visual is good.
From there, I was able to write a 10's number on paper and have him place the appropriate number of chains below each to equal that number.
He understood this immediately.
And, though it's basic, this is an introduction to multiplication!
In general, just sliding the beads over without even a purpose is entertaining to the kids. (Kind of like that Max Lucado book we got for Advent countdown.) But the way I presented it to Sophie was pretending each bead was a fruit or some other tangible thing and that we were going to count. For example, I told her "let's say we go blueberry picking and I pick four blueberries to put into our basket... let's count four blueberries". So she did. And then I'd say "okay, and then you picked two more... can you count two more blueberries into our basket?" And she did. And then I'd even add "but then you ate one! So let's take one away and count how many are left."
So basically we just used word problems that I'd say aloud to her or that she'd add onto herself. She chose the rest of the imaginary categories: cherries, peanuts, peas and lemons. Haha :) It was a big hit.
Of course, Will overheard and had to get in on it. So after Sophie had plenty of her own time, I wrote down some simple addition/subtraction problems (i.e. 2 + 4 = __ or 5 - 3 = __) and told him he could make the beads represent whatever food or object he wanted. He did some of the same, except he made the red ones apples and the green ones avocados. :)
I made sure he knew what "plus" or "minus" meant and what their symbols were (which he already did) and let him have at it.
I will be so sad when his hands lose all of their baby pudge. It's mostly gone. This picture looks pudgier than reality, but it made me think about it.
Sophie still loves our Leap Frog Numbers Ahoy video, but I'd like to continue working on number recognition with her in some other ways.
For 5's, I traced his hand 10 times onto paper. We acknowledged aloud that he had five fingers on each hand and that, in order to easily count all the fingers we'd drawn, we could count by 5's. This was much trickier than the 2's and, in reality, we had to count each finger individually as we were adding until we could easily see the pattern. So, in this case, having the visual of five fingers on a hand was not all that helpful.
On the other hand, seeing the Hundreds Chart and saying the pattern aloud was far easier than the 2's. I'm still glad we did the hand thing, because I want to present it to him from many angles so he knows they are all the same. But definitely counting aloud and looking at the chart were the most helpful with the 5's.
Skip counting by 10's was the probably the easiest and most fun, so we were able to do a little bit of an extension with this these. We started by making "10-bead chains" using pipe cleaners and pony beads. We made 10 of them - Will did five orange and I did five yellow.
This was a fine motor, counting exercise in itself!
I just bent and pinched the ends when we finished each chain. Easy and cheap.
When we finished, we again talked about how each chain represented "10" and discussed how each row on the Hundreds Chart had 10 numbers in it. So we placed a chain on each row and practiced saying aloud that "here's 10... and then if we add 10 more, that equals 20" etc. 
He did go through and stamp the 10's, but this concept was already understood and probably unnecessary. Still, another visual is good. 
From there, I was able to write a 10's number on paper and have him place the appropriate number of chains below each to equal that number.
He understood this immediately.
And, though it's basic, this is an introduction to multiplication!
Moving on...
One of Sophie's Christmas presents from mom and dad was a Melissa & Doug abacus. I found it for $5 at T.J. Maxx and knew we could use this for a number of learning activities. (No pun intended. :) )
In general, just sliding the beads over without even a purpose is entertaining to the kids. (Kind of like that Max Lucado book we got for Advent countdown.) But the way I presented it to Sophie was pretending each bead was a fruit or some other tangible thing and that we were going to count. For example, I told her "let's say we go blueberry picking and I pick four blueberries to put into our basket... let's count four blueberries". So she did. And then I'd say "okay, and then you picked two more... can you count two more blueberries into our basket?" And she did. And then I'd even add "but then you ate one! So let's take one away and count how many are left." 
So basically we just used word problems that I'd say aloud to her or that she'd add onto herself. She chose the rest of the imaginary categories: cherries, peanuts, peas and lemons. Haha :) It was a big hit.
Of course, Will overheard and had to get in on it. So after Sophie had plenty of her own time, I wrote down some simple addition/subtraction problems (i.e. 2 + 4 = __ or 5 - 3 = __) and told him he could make the beads represent whatever food or object he wanted. He did some of the same, except he made the red ones apples and the green ones avocados. :)
I made sure he knew what "plus" or "minus" meant and what their symbols were (which he already did) and let him have at it.
I will be so sad when his hands lose all of their baby pudge. It's mostly gone. This picture looks pudgier than reality, but it made me think about it. 
Sophie still loves our Leap Frog Numbers Ahoy video, but I'd like to continue working on number recognition with her in some other ways.
No comments:
Post a Comment