Numeracy in Early Learning

What is Numeracy?

"Numeracy is the capacity, confidence, and disposition to use mathematics in daily life... It is essential that the mathematical ideas children interact with are relevant and meaningful in the context of their current lives." - Early Years Learning Framework for Australia

Why is numeracy important?

Children and adults need numeracy and maths skills to do everyday things like:

solve problems – for example, have I got time to walk to school?
analyse and make sense of information – for example, how many wins does my team need to get to the top of the competition?
understand patterns – for example, what number would the next house in this street be?
make choices – for example, which bike is the best value?

Your child’s everyday experiences are full of learning opportunities that lay the foundations for numeracy.

Numeracy skills involve:

Understanding numbers
Counting
Solving number problems
Measuring
Estimating
Sorting
Noticing patterns
Adding and substracting numbers

What you can do in everyday activities?

Talking with your children, helps your child see and understand how and why this numeracy is useful.

For example, this happens when you talk about:

Objects of different sizes and talk about what objects are large and what objects are small
Different heights - when you are out walking look at tall trees and compare them with low fences use words like 'hgh' and ''low' to show this concept.
In the kitchen, have some fun with the kitchen scales. Collect objects from around the house and talk about thigs that are 'heavy' and 'light' to introduce concepts of measurement.

Babies: tips for introducing numeracy concepts

Your baby loves hearing your voices and will enjoy stories and songs with repetition, rhyme and numbers.

Have fun:

reading stories with numbers 0 for example, 'Goldilocks and the three bears'
playing counting and sorting games
singing number songs and rhymes

You can also talk about what you see around you - at home, at the park, or in the community:

'Lets find two matching socks'
'Look at the bird over there' or 'That's a tall tree'
'Let's have two pieces of banana' or 'How many cups do we need?'
'Its 7pm time for bed'
'Let's look for all the triangles' or 'The orange is round'

It's best if you can make these everyday numeracy activities and experiences playful and relaxed so that they 're fun for your child.

Toddlers and preschoolers: tips for introducing numeracy concepts

Through talking, everyday activities, play and reading, you will support yout child to develop communication, imagination and other skills for understanding math concepts. Here are some ideas:

'Look at the fast cars' or 'This bag is heavy'
'I'm cutting an orange in half' or 'Let's share these sultanas - one for me and one for you'
Point out and name the numbers you see, like the numbers on mailboxes, buses and road signs.
When you're out and about, talk about what's near or further away. For example, Let's sit on that bench nearby to grab our snack.
Talk about activities that happen at certain times of the day. For example, we eat breakfast at 7am.

Ideas for everyday activities:

Count shells at the beach, fruit at the shop and trees on the street. Count toys together as you and your child pack them away.
With your child describe or compare the shapes of leaves colours of flowers or sizes of birds
Go for a walk down your street and point out how each house or block has a number in a series
Use a growth chart or marks on a wall to measure your child's growing height and describe to your child what you're doing
Involve your child with cooking, children enjoy stirring, pouring, filling and mixing. This helps your child get familiar with concepts like counting, measuring, adding and estimating.

Ideas for Play

Go on a nature walk and let your child gather a mix of leaves, sticks,m pebbles and other natural items. Your child can sort them based into groups based on colour, size, shape and what they do.
Play simple board games, card games, and puzzles with shapes and numbers, like "Snap", or matching pairs or dominoes.
Play or sing music at different speeds. Your child can dance, jump or shake musical instruments to slow and fast songs. Sing nursery rhyme slowly and then speed up.
Race toy cars and talk about which came first, second or third.
Sing songs and read books with repeating, rhyming or rhythmic numbers. This will help your child understand patterns.
Play outside games like ‘I spy’, hopscotch, skittles and ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf’.

How do we use Puppet play and song to support Numeracy?

Numeracy is not always taught in the classroom: it means having the confidence and skills to use math's to solve problems in everyday life. Numeracy is as important as literacy - it's sometimes called ‘mathematical literacy’

Here are songs and nursery rhymes that can enhance numeracy.

Five cheeky monkeys jumping on the bed.

Five little monkeys jumping on the bed,
One fell down and bumped his head,
Mama called the doctor and the doctor said,
No more monkeys jumping on the bed!

Four little monkeys jumping on the bed,
One fell down and bumped his head,
Mama called the doctor and the doctor said,
No more monkeys jumping on the bed!

Three little monkeys jumping on the bed,
One fell down and bumped her head,
Mama called the doctor and the doctor said,
No more monkeys jumping on the bed!

Two little monkeys jumping on the bed,
One fell down and bumped his head,
Mama called the doctor and the doctor said,
No more monkeys jumping on the bed!

One little monkey jumping on the bed,
She fell down and bumped her head,
Mama called the doctor and the doctor said,
Put those monkeys back to bed!

Five little speckled frogs.

Five green, speckled frogs
Sat on a mossy log
Eating the most delicious bugs, yum, yum!
One jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool
Now there are four speckled frogs, glub, glub

Four green, speckled frogs
Sat on a mossy log
Eating the most delicious bugs, yum, yum!
One jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool
Now there are three speckled frogs, glub, glub

Three green, speckled frogs
Sat on a mossy log
Eating the most delicious bugs, yum, yum!
One jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool
Now there are two speckled frogs, glub, glub

Two green, speckled frogs
Sat on a mossy log
Eating the most delicious bugs, yum, yum!
One jumped into the pool
Where it was nice and cool
Now there is one speckled frog, glub, glub

One lonely, speckled frog
Sat on the mossy log

1, 2, 3, 4, 5,
Once I Caught a Fish Alive

One, Two, Three, Four, Five,
Once I caught a fish alive,
Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten,
Then I threw him back again.
Why did you let him go?
Because he bit my finger so.
Which finger did he bite?
This little finger on my right.