Valentines Math

We have been working on A LOT of math lately since Diego has been showing so much interest in numbers. Here are a couple of activities that we did this week.

Ok, so I got a little carried away on the stickers here. The plan was for Diego to hunt for and then count the number of the different types of hearts on the card (just little the Christmas Tree we did for Christmas.) Since I put too many stickers, it was a little difficult for him to count them all with out losing his place. We ended up using it more as an I-Spy kind of activity. It was still fun and I put it on a piece of foam so we can use it again next year.

I made these pattern sheets with heart stickers. (Can you tell that I got a great deal on 1000 Valentines stickers?) Diego has a hard time with patterns. The next time I make it I will make just one type of pattern at a time and repeat it many times.

Christmas Math- Mazes

I consider this a math activity since it helps with spacial skills. I found this maze and several others here. I like that there are mazes of different difficulty levels. This one ended up being too easy so I printed off a more complicated one. I cover them with a piece of contact paper so that Diego can use a dry erase marker. It drives me nuts when he marks on something for 2 seconds and then throws it in the trash. I am hoping to keep these for next year and then for Mateo in a couple of years.

Christmas Math- Counting up to 8

One of the Four Preschool Goals for Math is counting up to 8 objects. I first cut out a Christmas tree from construction paper. Next, I covered the tree with Christmas stickers. You need several of each type of sticker.

Next, I made an "answer sheet" with one of each sticker represented on the tree. D's challenge was to count the stickers on the tree and tell me how many there were. I wrote the numeral on the notecard. So that we could do this activity more than once, I covered the notecard with contact paper and I wrote with a dry-erase marker.

Christmas Math- Shapes

One of the Four Preschool Math Goals is to identify at least four shapes. D knows more than four so I used this activity more for cutting practice (something that D loves to do.) I drew the shapes on different colors of construction paper and D insisted on doing EVERYTHING himself after that, from the cutting to the gluing. D will be four at the end of the month and I am amazed at how much he has grown and matured in last year.

Christmas Math- Number Recognition

I found this great website that describes Four Preschool Goals for Math.

Colors and shapes

• knows about colors and shapes
• identifies 6 colors
• identifies 4 shapes

Create a two-piece pattern

• creates and understands two-piece patterns

Compare objects

• uses words to make comparisons (bigger, biggest, smaller, smallest, heavier, heaviest, etc.)

Counting

• Can count to 20
• Can count a group up to 8 objects
• recognizes numerals 1 - 10

I have used these goals to help me plan out some Preschool Math activities this month. I figured that using Christmas as a theme can make anything fun-- even math.

Here is our first game:

Number Recognition 1-20

Do you recognize this? It is an empty Christmas ornament container.

I cut out the numbers from 1-20 using green and red paper and taped them to the bottom of the container. To play the game, D stood a few feet away from the box and tossed an object (we used dice) into the box and he had to name the number with the dice.
Variations:

Younger children:

Color Recognition

Leave off the numbers and just put different colors in each square.

Older children:

Addition

Write down the numbers and add them up.

More or Less

Throw two dice into the box and figure out which number is larger or smaller.