Preschool Math is Not Just about Being Able to Count

Parents may gawk at the idea that their babies are being taught math in preschool, but there are creative ways to start laying the foundation for simple concepts at an early age. Experts agree that children who just rattle off the numbers from 1 to 20 may not really have a good grasp of numbers until they can perform simple exercises like two is greater than one and five is a bigger number than four.

Family Bar Graph

Preschool math need not even begin addition and subtraction as far as sums and writing is concerned, but it can explain how many and which group is bigger. One simple preschool math lesson is asking the children to bring a family picture from home. Teachers then make a make shift bar graph with number in the family on the x axis and number of kids who have that many in their family on the y axis. They can then stick the pictures one on top of the other corresponding to the number of people in the family and see at the end of the day which ‘number wins’. If most kids come from a family with two parents and one sibling, then four would be the winning number and so on.

Friendship Mix

A friendship mix project is another way of reinforcing preschool math skills. For instance, each child is given a bag full of a dry snack such as pretzels, popcorn, marshmallows, crackers etc. They are then given a bag and asked to count and put five pieces of the snack in front of them in to the bag and then pass the bag to the next child. This way they’ll get a variety of snacks to eat and take home as well as practice counting while doing it.

Apart from numbers, preschoolers can also learn math concepts like stacking when they are given a variety of boxes and bottles and asked which can stack the easiest such as cereal boxes flat on the table one on top of the other as opposed to juice bottles. They can try building towers with various shapes and learn about how flat surfaces are easier to stack without having to go in to names of prisms and pyramids, cubes and cylinders.

Star Chart

A reward system for the class is another way to help learn preschool math concepts. For instance, every time the class or a student in the class is on their best behavior, the class gets a shiny star on a poster board in clear view. After a set number of stars, they get to go on a field trip or have a pizza party. This way the children will be motivated to behave and they can count how far they have come along to meeting their goal of the treat promised to them.