Garden Math: Counting and Number Sense

Learning and growing occurs in our backyard garden every day. Math is a great academic connection and we are fortunate to have a guest post from a fellow hands-on, play loving, cultural mum of 2 young children here with us today. As part of the KIDS IN THE GARDEN series, the author of “The Fairy and the Frog,” shares how she encourages her children to recognize numbers, count found objects, and record their findings in a journal in this easy-to-do garden activity. ~ Amanda

Counting in the Garden

Learning outside can be super fun.
We live in flat so we don’t have a garden, but we’re lucky enough to have an allotment and a Grandma who lives near by with a garden which we regularly play in. Both feature regularly as venues for outside pretend play and fun.

The Fairy loves isn’t keen on writing for ‘the sake it’ but if there is a purpose she is much keener. When I suggested that I challenged her to find out how many things were in Grandma’s garden she was very excited and even suggested writing a list of things to hunt for.

clip board writing and math garden activity

After thinking about what was in the garden we drew a chart. She decided we’d hunt for flowers, trees, mini beasts and birds.

preschool garden scavenger hunt for white flowers

Then we went hunting.

preschool garden scavenger hunt, counting

We used a clip board to help keep our writing and our numbers neat.

Ways to extend this activity

use a tally chart rather than writing the number.
have a garden hunt in a neighbour’s garden and compare what you find.
have a garden hunt at different times of the year.

For additional garden-themed articles by The Fairy and The Frog, we recommend

This post is brought to you by The Fairy and The Frog. The Fairy and The Frog’s mum wears many hats, as well as being a mum of 2, an avid coffee drinker and keen (but not always successful) gardener, she is also a pediatric Speech and Language Therapist (Pathologist) and blogger.

The Fairy and The Frog is packed full of play based learning, tips for developing language, craft and family friendly activities. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and Google +.

For more gardening articles, visit the main Kids in the Garden: Learning and Growing page here.