Montessori Inspired Counting

My twins really enjoy Montessori inspired math activities.  I try to change up the materials we use each time. Generally I place the activity on a tray or the light table, that way the pieces don't get mixed up or knocked off the table. Here are some examples!

real sea shells and sea shell aquarium accents

Numbers laminated and glued onto wooden squares with home made bead chains (red beads strung onto sparkly pipe cleaners). Count the beads on each bead chain!

Laminated Mickey mouse heads cut with a mickey mouse shape punch from JoAnn's with Mickey mouse plastic ice cube's written on with dry erase marker.

Dollar tree clear plates with trees drawn on them. I used sharpie markers to draw the trees, then paired them with acrylic apples from Michaels.

Glass gems and Light Table Numbers

Flash cards and paper clips 

Wood slices from Lakeshore and home made bead chains

Real sea shells and fancy stringing rings by Roylco

1. point to a numbered plate
2. ask the child what number it is, help if they can not answer correctly,
3. then you can either instruct the child to put that amount of counters on the plate or mix it up by saying  X amount of one color, X amount of another color, etc.

We used clown counters but we also have bear counters as well as many various light table counters.

example:  for the number seven, I might ask him to put 4 red clowns and 3 blue clowns on the 7 plate.

for the number 5, I might ask him to put 5 yellow clowns.

then for the number 4 I might ask for 1 yellow clown and 3 orange clowns.

My twins are 5, but you can make this simpler for a 4, 3, or 2 year old. If the child has learning disabilities, you might have to work up to this and make it simpler in the mean time.

This activity can be more than just counting, it can be colors, counting, and following instructions


Plates are from the dollar tree, Clowns from Constructive Playthings

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