During the current period of quarantine, I watched a thought-provoking video by accident. It featured a crying child begging his parents to let him go outside to play but he was told by his mother that there was a fatal virus outside. To our surprise, the boy naively said that he could not wait to play with the virus. The reopening of schools has been postponed for over a month, which means children have been stranded at home for such a long time. However, the current isolation of pupils and their parents does not affect our love and care for them. Please follow me to discover the engaging and inspiring mathematical activities that can be carried out at home. The structure of nursery children’s number cognitive ability generally consists of five dimensions, namely, number, calculation, measurement, space and pattern. Among them, number is the basis and preparation for understanding abstract features of objects; calculation is necessary to abstract and summarise the universal relations between things; measurement is the comparison of a quantity to be measured with a standard quantity of the same kind; space is an important aspect of understanding things, involving the relationship between graphics and space; and patterns refer to the understanding of the internal relationships between objects. Although they have their own characteristics, they also show a certain degree of correlation. However, no matter the aspect of knowledge or ability training they are learning, for nursery children they should have a focus towards being multifaceted yet basic enough for them to understand, as well as interesting, enlightening and applicable to real life. Experiencing the fun of mathematics is very important, as it helps to master the corresponding mathematical knowledge and concepts that lay a good foundation for mathematics learning in the future. To this end, what can we do at home to create opportunities for children to learn these mathematical concepts? Tips Firstly, we can start with food, for everyone loves culinary delicacies and children are no exception. Playing with food is a good way for children to learn the concepts of mathematics. For example, when children begin to have breakfast or snacks, you can allow them to play with the round biscuits, triangular watermelon, oval kiwi, rectangular carrot sticks etc. Then, you can motivate your children to string these shapes together based on certain rules, such as a slice of triangular watermelon, a slice of oval kiwi, a slice of triangular watermelon, a slice of oval kiwi and so on. Or you can draw these shapes on paper and ask children to match the fruits with corresponding shapes.
Secondly, children can try to add diverse shapes of vegetables and fruits to a tortilla, creating their own unique faces. When they finish, ask them what kind of ingredients they used making the faces. They may tell you: “I used two slices of cucumber as eyes, red pepper as ears, a cherry tomato for a nose and five slices of bananas to make a big mouth.” This narration process also helps young children to develop their expressive ability alongside their mathematical understanding of shapes and numbers.
In addition, if you have donuts, candy or other snacks at home, you can design a matching game of number and quantity, and gradually increase the difficulty according to children’s competence. We generally recommenced that the number can range from 1 to 20. If children want to try more challenging tasks, they can be asked to visually count the quantity of a cluster of items. For example, put a pile of grapes before them and check whether they can count the total number of grapes. Then, let them to compare the quantity of this group to another group. Which group has more or less grapes and by how many?
Tips Making food is one of children’s favourites. It not only allows them to experience being a cook, but also teaches them mathematical concepts in a subtle way. Parents may choose some simple recipes that are easy to get started with children, namely, pasta, salad, cupcakes and pizza. Please remember to get everything ready before you cook, such as measuring cups and spoons, knives suitable for children to use, pots and pans and all kinds of sauces. Children should be encouraged to get involved in the whole process, from washing vegetables and fruits and chopping them, to measuring the amount of seasoning or other ingredients with cups and spoons. If an oven is needed, children, under the guidance of adults, can try to adjust the baking temperature and time. Older children (from 4 years) can also illustrate the recipes or read the English recipes with their parents. Once the dishes are cooked, it is time to share food with family members. Children can count the number of people in your home and think about how to equally allocate the food. I believe it will be an interesting and memorable mathematical activity if the children have a chance to try it.
The following activities are closely connected to children’s daily lives, letting them serve as good reference points for parents to develop their mathematical concepts: Singing out the numbers You can choose songs or nursery rhymes related to numbers. Singing or reciting them can consolidate children’s understanding of relations between those numbers. Reading a calendar Talk about dates in the calendar with your children. How many days does a week have, or how is the weather on this specific day? Discussion about the calendar is conducive to enhancing their abilities regarding calculation and sequence. Weather topics will help them establish logical thinking prowess by asking them follow-up questions like what kind of clothes they should wear in order to adapt to the changing weather. Building blocks Children should be provided with wooden or plastic blocks, or even waste boxes and milk cartons. They can gain a sense of different planes and three-dimensional shapes and learn the relationships between diverse shapes while building with blocks. It will benefit younger children particularly as they gain the ability to understand the concept of size. Tunnel time You can take advantage of large carton boxes to make a ‘tunnel’ that children can crawl through. It will enable them to better perceive and understand the meaning of space. Sequencing patterns You can supply your children with different kinds of beans and pastas (farfalle, macaroni, fusilli etc.) and lead them to sequence in accordance with patterns. For example, the pattern could be one white bean, two red beans, one white bean… Comparison of length You can guide your children in cutting ribbon, paper and knitting wool at home and then compare the length of those materials together, which will aid their understanding of the concept of length. Doing housework/washing clothes You can invite your children to do housework with you, asking them to classify clothes according to colours and types of them before you put them in the washing machine. For example, they can sort out all pants, socks and coats in separate baskets under your instructions. In order to review the relations between quantities and nouns, you may guide them purposefully to give you three coats, a pair of pants or socks.
