One of the things I started to do with Grace when she was younger (around when she turned 2 years old) was counting steps and counting when we walked.
I can remember when we were moving into our new house and my good friend let us stay at her lake house for a week while we were getting the house ready for us to move in. The lake house had a beautiful view of the lake and the back porch had a large stair case that led out to the back yard. Grace dragged me up and down that stair case about 20 times every day for a week. She just loved it! As we would go up and down we would count the steps together. Thank goodness, our new house has a playroom upstairs and Grace can continue counting her stairs. She’s so good at it now that I decided I wanted to make it into a fun learning activity for every day.
This number and counting activity is so easy to make and set up. Every time we go upstairs to the playroom Grace wants to do this fun activity. Let’s get started……………… and don’t worry if you don’t have stairs, keep reading because this activity can be done without stairs too!
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Materials:
Directions: I cut the different colored construction paper into fourths and then wrote the numbers 1-15 on the pieces of construction paper. One number per piece of construction paper. Every time we are getting ready to go upstairs and play I take a few minutes to place the pieces of construction paper on the stairs. I start with the number 1 on the bottom stair and work my way up to the top stair. As she walks up each step she says the number verbally and then she picks up the piece of construction paper with that number on it. I then ask her to look at the number, show it to me, and then say the number again. We do this until we get to the top.
Don’t have stairs…………………………… try putting the number cards on the floor and have your child walk or hop to count the numbers.
How did my daughter do with this activity?
Grace really loves doing this activity! She can count stairs really well but we are working on number recognition so sometimes even after saying the number verbally when she would pick up the piece of construction paper and look at the number she would say she didn’t know what number was on it. We do this activity about 3 to 4 times a week and this will help her be able to identify/recognize the numbers.
On the way down to stairs when we are done playing in the playroom Grace usually asks for the number cards. As she goes down the stairs she puts a number card on each step and tells me to tell her the numbers. She doesn’t put them down in order yet but she likes to be the teacher sometimes!
What is she learning during this activity?
- Recognizing numbers and their name
- number sequencing – learning that numbers go in order
- counting on
- language development – counting out load and saying the correct numbers name
- balance – being able to go upstairs and pick up the number cards
- Following directions
Extending this activity is so easy!
There are so many things that can be done to extend this fun and easy activity.
- Patterns – once they are able to correctly identify numbers you can create number patterns (example 1,2,1,2,1,2). This will help prepare them for addition.
- Instead of using number cards you can teacher them other skills while going up the stairs or walking like; letter recognition, shapes, or colors.
- Once then have the numbers 1-10 down you can then have them learn 11-20. Keep going and see how far your child can go!
My daughter LOVED this activity and can wait to do it when we go upstairs. Have your kids do this easy learning activity and they’ll learn to love number counting too!
