Primary School Prep DIY Guide-Math-Page 4

Colors: With colours you can make flash cards with shapes on a piece of A4 paper and color it in with different colors. However, you can also buy flash cards with shapes of different colors to make it easier for you. 

Then show your child the color on the flash card and say, “red” if it is the red flash card, “blue” if it is the blue flash card, etc. 

  

2 D Shapes:   

You can create 2D shapes yourself by drawing them on a flash card. Alternatively, it should be quite easy to buy the 2D shapes on flash cards online. 

Then, show it to your child and say the name of the shape as you show it to them. 

We mean by 2D shapes; shapes such as the circle, square, rhombus, triangle, etc.... 

  

Skip counting: We advise you to teach your child to skip count before teaching them multiplication. When your child can skip count you will see that in the future, multiplication and  division will be very easy for them. Again, you don’t need any flash cards. You just say it. Ideally, you should use a song. 

So, for skip counting in 2s, you would ideally, with a nice song, sing to your child, “two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve, fourteen, sixteen, eighteen, twenty, twenty-four.”   

If you do it as a song it will keep their interest and make it more enjoyable for your child. 

 

Stage 2 Topics 

 

We advise teaching the below topics as the next stage of topics:  

  

Normal Counting: You will eventually need to teach your child to count but do not do it straight away. Focus on quantity recognition first. Depending on how old your child is, after six months to one year of quantity recognition,  teach your child to count. You don’t need a flash card to do this, you just teach them by counting yourself. Start with 1-10, then 1-20, then 1-50, etc.. 

If you can do it through a song, then even better.    

Remember, if you have taught them quantity recognition first, when you later start to teach them to count i,e.; “1, 2, 3, 4, 5,” they understand what those numbers represent in quantities. Contrast that with what typically happens with toddlers who are taught to count without being taught quantities; they learn to count but may not necessarily understand what those numbers mean.  

  

Doubling : Using the dot cards that you did the quantity recognition with, you can also teach your child doubling. Start off by teaching the double of 1 to 10. 

So, if you wanted to teach for example, “double-two equals four,” as you show your child the quantity recognition with two dots, you say, “double two”. Then, you put down the flash card with two dots and say, “equals”. You then hold up the flash card with four dots and say, “four.”  

  

Solve for unknown numbers: This is a good topic to teach your child. You start off by preparing simple equations for solving addition and subtraction of unknown numbers. Use numbers, 5 and below.  

 

For example,  you prepare a flash card with the below: 

 

2 + y = 3   

y = 1 

Or   

3 – y = 2  

y = 1