Stories, rhymes and games really help children to visualise the maths that we want them to understand.

One more

In the Gingerbread Man tale, we notice the increasing number of hungry characters chasing him. Run run as fast as you can, you can’t catch me!

The number of elephants, that went out to play on a spider’s web, increased by one each time until the web fell down. I’m not sure I want to meet the spider, which managed to spin a web that would support four elephants!

At home, you could give the children a few grapes or raisins or cubes.

How many do they have? Can they tell you how many they will have if you give them one more? Count to check.

Ask children to listen carefully to you clap 1, 2 or 3 times. Can they clap one more time than you?

Taking one away

As the frogs jump off the log into the cool pool, we notice how many is one less than 5, then one less than 4, and so on.

Another game to try at home is to drop a few small stones into a tin. Ask the children to listen carefully as you drop them in one at a time. They can count aloud as they hear the stones hit the bottom. Ask your child how many stones will be in the tin after you have taken one out.

We love these stories, rhymes and games for developing number sense!