Showing posts with label Math. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Math. Show all posts

Friday, March 13, 2015

5 Preschool Pi Day Activities

Ok.  Pi day is coming up this Saturday.  Are you ready to celebrate it with some fun activities?   Last year I came up with 3 Pi Day Activities for elementary aged children, like making Pi Day Bracelets and making 2 Types of Pi Inspired Artwork!  This year I thought it would be a fun challenge to try to introduce Pi Day to my Preschooler.

Pi Day celebrates Pi, the mathematical constant that describes the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter.  Pi's digits stretch infinitely long, never repeat, and seem to be random.  I really wanted to share my love for math with my 3 year old.  So here are 5 Preschool Pi Day Activities that are fun, easy to set up, and great opportunities for some hands on learning!


5 Preschool Pi Day Activities


5 fun Preschool pi Day Activities



Friday, October 17, 2014

Preschool Science: Let's Make Charts!

While I enjoy making things with Chuck, I'm also always looking for easy ways to incorporate mathematics and science into our daily activities too.   I loved math and science as a child, so I'd love it if he appreciated those subjects too.  Since he's only 3, our activities have to very pretty hands-on and relevant to his interests (like our shape dice,  cardboard bridges, and shape touch and find activities.)  We love taking walks outside.  So I incorporated science and math into our walk and created this chart to help us count the number of different things in our neighborhood. 

STEM ACTIVITY:  Make Charts With Preschoolers!

Easy preschool STEM activity- Make charts!


This was a super easy STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) activity to do with my preschooler.  It required very little prep and we practiced our observation, counting, and data analysis skills in the process!

Here's how we did the activity!

Friday, September 26, 2014

Make and Play with Shape Dice!

Are you looking for some fun and educational activities to do with your preschooler?  Right now Chuck's home with me and we try to squeeze in at least one educational activity in each day. So far we've tested out cardboard rigidity by building bridgesexplored art materials like scientists, and learned about shapes with a shape touch and feel game.  

While I enjoy thinking up new activities to do with Chuck, sometimes I do get burned out.  It's hard finding new activities everyday day!  So that's why I'm excited to announce a new collaboration that I'm doing with 4 other fabulous bloggers.  Twice a month we will be presenting 5 different takes on preschool learning themes.  Yup.  Isn't that neat?  I'm super stoked.  So in addition to seeing one great idea here, you'll also see links to 4 other really creative and fun preschool learning activities.

Our first collaborative preschool theme is Shapes and here's my activity!  (Definitely check out the 4 other ideas at the end of the post!)

DIY Shape Dice


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Cool right?  Instead of using a normal dice to play board games, here's a fun twist.  Switch out the numbers and use shapes instead!  Now your child can learn counting and shapes at the same time.

So let's make a dice and see how we can play with it!

Friday, August 29, 2014

Shape Touch and Find Game

Now that Chuck is almost 3 I'm trying to do more educational activities with him.  Besides learning our numbers, we're also working on identifying different shapes.  Here's a fun shape activity that we've recently been doing together.        

Let's learn about shapes!


Shape Touch and Find Game:  A great way to teach shapes and math to little kids

(This post contains affiliate links.  Thank you so much for your support!)


Early childhood mathematics education is something I feel quite strongly about.  Before I was a mommy, I was working on my doctorate degree in education. Although I never finished writing my dissertation (for reasons that you can about here),  I did spend  many years observing and studying how preschool children learn mathematics.  I also had the wonderful opportunity to work on a research-based preschool math curriculum called  Big Math For Little Kids.

This Touch and Find Shape game is one of my favorites from that curriculum.  It's a great activity because it helps young children to learn the number of sides and corners in shapes in a really fun and interactive way. 

Let's play the touch and find shape game!


Sunday, July 13, 2014

DIY Felt Shape Activity

Are you looking for a fun, open-ended, creative activity to do with the kids?  Then this DIY Felt Shape Activity is right up your alley!  It's easy to make and provides kids with countless opportunities to be creative, use their imaginations, visualize things spatially, and practice using their mathematical language!    

DIY Felt Shape Activity

DIY Felt Shape Activity:  Use different shapes to create scenes!


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Friday, March 14, 2014

Pi Day Activity- Make Pi Art!

Happy Pi Day everyone!  I remember thinking this holiday was really cool when I was younger.  We let out our inner nerds, drank soda, and ate a pizza pie in class.  Earlier this week I whetted your mathy appetite when I shared how I turned Pi into wearable art.  My super easy and colorful Pi Day Bracelets were made by stringing different colored beads according to the digits in Pi.  Today I'm celebrating Pi Day with two colorful and geometric pieces of Pi Day Inspired Artwork.

 "Easy As Pi" Artwork!

Turn Pi into lovely math artwork

And if you have younger preschool aged children, check out my 5 easy ways to celebrate Pi Day with Preschoolers!


Now let's celebrate your inner nerd and create some fun artwork to brighten up your wall.  Let's get started!

Sunday, March 9, 2014

Pi Day Activity- Make Pi Day Bracelets!

This Friday (3/14) is Pi Day!  Pi is a mathematical constant referring to the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter.  It's an irrational number, which means that it goes on forever and never shows a repeating pattern.  Every year it's celebrated on 3/14 because the first three digits of Pi are 3,1, and 4.  Now if you're looking for an easy way to celebrate Pi day, we've got a great collection of Pi Day Inspired Activities.  Today I'm sharing these nifty Pi Day Bracelets!  What makes this a great Pi Day Activity?  Well, the beads are strung according to Pi's digits. (Cool, right?)   It's a great way to combine math, art, and crafting!

Pi Day Craft Activity Make Pi inspired bracelets
Interested in making your own set of Pi Day Inspired bracelets?  Keep reading!

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Make a square and cube bubble

We are definite bubble lovers over here.  With the colder weather outside, we've just been blowing them at home over a beach towel.  Recently I learned that bubbles didn't have to just be spherical shaped.  They could also look like squares and cubes too. What? No way! 

Yes way!  Behold!  A cubic bubble!
Make a cube bubble

Whoa.  It's bubble play for us older folks! Keep reading to see how we made different shaped bubbles:

Thursday, December 1, 2011

Healing math

I was having a rough day yesterday and feeling quite glum. Thankfully, a friend called and cheered me up with some kind words and a math question. (She's studying to be a teacher.) I'm not sure why, but working on her math question cheered me right up.

Here's the question:

We know that
A pair of suspenders and a pair of socks cost 18 dollars.
A tie and a pair of socks cost 22 dollars.
A tie and a pair of cufflinks cost 25 dollars.
A shirt and a belt cost 37 dollars.
A pair of cufflinks and a shirt cost 33 dollars.
A belt and a pair of socks cost 17 dollars.

Given all this, how much does each item (pair of suspenders, pair of socks, shirt, tie, pair of cufflinks, and belt) cost?

Have fun!

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Pumpkin play (Part 1)

This past weekend hubby, Baby Chuck, and I were invited to a pumpkin carving party.  We had a lot of fun and I learned a few new carving tips and tricks. 

Here's my finished pumpkin:
My homage to pumpkin pi.  (Get it?  Get it?  Oy vey, I'm too corny. )

Five finished pumpkins sitting in a row.

Let the countdown to Halloween begin!

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

MoMath?

A new museum is going to open in 2012:
It's the New York Museum of Mathematics!

Anyone interested in visiting it with me?

To see this photo and read the accompanying Times article, click here

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Pathways to love

With Valentine's day just around the corner, I thought it might be fun to include a Valentine's day inspired math brain teaser.

Can you figure out the number of paths that spell the word "Love" if only vertical and horizontal moves to adjacent squares are permitted?





By the way, here's the answer to yesterday's math brain teaser.

Did you figure it out?



Answer to be revealed tomorrow!
(Problem taken from NCTM Mathematics Teacher Dec 2010/Jan 2011)

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Virtual cutting

Last week I found myself happily lost in a maze of math brain teasers.  Here's one that I really enjoyed: 

Make one cut to the first figure (a) and then rearrange the pieces for the second figure (b).



Answer and next math brain teaser will be revealed tomorrow!
(Problem taken from NCTM Mathematics Teacher Dec 2010/Jan 2011)

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Admire the beauty (again)!

Do you remember learning the Pythagorean theorem ( a2 + b2 = c2 ) when you were in school? Well, here's a visual way of showing it.  Eureka.  Isn't it beautiful?

Annairizi of Arabia (circa A.D. 900)

Is anyone out there a quilter?  I bet this would make a really lovely (albeit nerdy) quilt.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Admire the beauty!

My hubby recently showed me a book of different math proofs performed through pictures.  That's right, no words or numbers neededWho knew it could be done?  Here's one that I sat pondering awhile. Then, eureka! I got it.  And now I tell you, dear reader, admire the beauty! 


Sum of Cubes:   (Solomon W. Golomb)
13+ 23+ 33+…+ n3 = (1 + 2 + 3 + …+ n)2