BY HEJIRA CONVERY, KINDICARE

MAY 19, 2023

Your under-five doesn’t need to balance the family budget or make sense of the global financial market, but numbers do make the world go round, and basic mathematical skills begin in early learning.  

Counting, measuring, weighing and timing are all concepts your mini-mathematician can start to grasp, and if your child attends a Montessori service, then the whole ‘grasping’ thing is particularly pertinent! 

Montessori teaches Maths in a very hands-on way, and to see how this works in practice, we’ve spoken with Smeeta Vanmali, Montessori Advisor at Habitat Early Learning.  

Smeeta explains that Montessori educators teach Maths by offering specially designed didactic materials that foster kinaesthetic, tactile learning.   

This might sound high-level for young learners (and the rest of us!), but ‘didactic’ just means that these materials are designed to teach, and ‘kinaesthetic’ learning means that children are getting a feel for where, and how, their body parts are moving. 

In the classroom, Montessori educators set up different presentations of these materials to teach early numeracy, and many of the materials are designed so that children discover learning outcomes on their own – through repetition, practice, trial and error.  

Smeeta explains that the interactive, hands-on nature of these materials, “Makes it possible for young children to attach concrete concepts to abstract ideas.”  

And like in mainstream Maths teaching, play is a big part of the learning process.  

Under-fives have fun touching different materials and trying new things, and although Montessori is an alternative educational approach, this kind of Maths teaching ticks all the boxes when it comes to the National Quality Standard and the specific early learning outcomes that are important for each child.  

At Habitat Early Learning, educators think carefully about which presentations will be engaging for different ages and learners. 

Dr Maria Montessori believed that the goal of early learning is to cultivate a child’s natural desire to learn, so Habitat’s educators think about what will inspire each child’s curiosity and interest, rather than sitting with them to recite their 1, 2, 3s. 

‘Number Rods’ is one presentation that’s interesting to early numeracy learners, and it involves 10 wooden rods, coloured with strips of red and blue paint. 

Each rod is 10cm longer than the last one, and for this presentation, the child starts by picking up the shortest rod and laying it on a mat, then repeating the process till all the rods are laid out in lines (in no particular length order). 

The child then practises ordering the rods from longest to shortest to make a staircase shape. 

Once this is done, they take one rod at a time and look at the coloured sections.  

If the rod has one red strip and one blue strip, they place a hand on it and say, “Two,” and if it has two red strips and one blue strip, they touch the rod and say, “Three.” 

There are ways to extend this presentation, and Smeeta says, “Working with number rods gives children a sense of length and of patterned colour, while also giving them a sense of sequence of numbers acquired through auditory memory.” 

‘Sandpaper Numbers’ is another Montessori presentation that teaches numeracy to early learners.  

The child is given a box with pieces of sandpaper in it.  

Each bit of sandpaper has a number cut out of it (from zero to nine), and the educator starts by taking out the number one and tracing their finger over it three times, saying, “One.” 

They invite the child to repeat this action, before moving on to the number two card.  

They trace this number three times with their finger, saying ‘Two,” invite the child to repeat this action, then move on to the number three card. 

When the child knows the look, feel and sound of these three numbers, they can then move on to the other numbers, working their way up to nine in different sessions. 

Along the way, the child learns how to recognise the numbers zero to nine and they’re introduced to the idea of number sequencing.  

Smeeta says the Sandpaper Numbers presentation also gives them a sensorial impression of how number symbols tie in with quantity, and it helps to prepare a child for number-writing.  

If you’re interested in teaching Maths the Montessori way, you might like to invest in some specially designed materials of your own. 

However, you don’t necessarily need to stock up on didactic materials to teach early numeracy to your under-five.  

Smeeta says everyday objects and experiences can tell your child a lot about numbers.  

For example: 

• Sorting laundry provides opportunities to count items of clothing and pair up socks, which indirectly teaches your child about groups of two.
• Packing away groceries also teaches your child counting, as you put apples into a fruit bowl or fresh flowers into a vase.  
• Using a visual timer during bath time (like the timer on your phone) shows your child how time decreases second-by-second and minute-by-minute.
• Timing your child doing fun activities also teaches them about numbers and time. For example, you might say, “Let’s see how long it takes for you to run to the fence and back?”
• Baking and cooking involves measuring and weighing ingredients, which introduces your child to big numbers (like 180 grams) and little fractions (like ¼ cup).   
• And weighing fresh produce at the shops provides another opportunity for them to learn about grams and kilos. 

Once you start looking for ‘Maths moments,’ you’ll see that numbers pop up everywhere in family life, and there are lots of ways to get creative with early numeracy! 

Would you like to know more about Montessori? 

This article explains how Montessori plays out in the early learning environment. 

And if you’re looking for an amazing Montessori service, like Habitat Early Learning or Montessori Academy, then KindiCare is a great place to start >>>