A Counting Up Craft

My daughter is having some math issues. This gives me great grief as I am pretty proficient mathematically. I’m very visual and it was driving me nuts every time she would add 5 + 1 by starting with 1,2,3,4,5…….. 6! The number one reason for this is simple… well, she’s in Kindergarten. She turned six after the “Birthday Cut off” for public school. THEY say she’s in Kindergarten, I say she’s almost in First Grade. Doesn’t matter now, she’s home schooled… I can teach her whatever I want. SHE wanted to learn addition. She did okay with it, once I convinced her that 2 + 2 was NOT 22!

It wasn’t until we purchased the “Hooked on Math: Addition” workbooks that I realized the concept I was trying to teach her actually had a name: Counting Up. They put a little line on the top of her work book pages that had the numbers 1-20 on top. She could put her finger on “2″ and count up 2 more numbers to get the answer 4…

We started using her ruler as our number line for all of our math worksheets. Worked well until we had 8 + 9. Her ruler stops at 12. So I created a “counting up” chain for her to use. The instructions are below:

Supplies:

The numbers 1-20 printed on cardstock… feel free to use mine Number Cards

Plastic straws (about three will do)

String, or cord… anything your kids would normally use to make bracelets or beaded keychains etc. Mine was some sort of plastic stuff

Tape

Scissors

Beads, to weigh down the ends.

1. Cut out the number cards

2. Tie a knot in one end of your string and add three to four beads.

3. Cut the straw into pieces (at least as wide as your tape, not wider than the number cards) and add them to the string.. you need twenty total pieces of straw.

4. Add three to four beads, leave some room (at least six or seven inches) then tie another knot.

5. Be careful with this step… make sure your numbers are all facing the same direction and in order and tape the cards to the straw pieces.

My daughter lays hers across her table. She finds the first numeral in the equation, and slides over the number of numerals to be added to the first one… the last card she touches is the answer!

Ok, it’s cheesy, but it got her to do her math homework

Turkey Sam, Turkey Jo and Momma Turkey… Puppet Crafts

Thanksgiving Turkey Puppet Craft

by Momma TaderDoodles

Great for young ages too!

Supplies:

(per puppet)

One brown paper lunch bag

One paper plate

Feathers (colored feathers sold very inexpensively at local craft stores… i.e. Wal Mart )

Glue

Stapler (because I have little patience)

White, Black, Red and Orange construction paper, fun foam sheets, felt, etc.

(you can also use “wiggly eyes” instead of making your own… I just couldn’t find mine)

Crayons or Markers (paint if your brave… I was not)

1. Color the bottom of the paper plate. I tried convincing my girls that this part should be brown but they both insisted their turkeys did not have brown behinds…

2. Fold the paper plate in half, and staple feathers between the edges, so that if forms a fan. This can be glued. I would recommend that you apply the glue and feathers and pinch it together with clothespins until it’s dry. I do not have that kind of patience and neither do my children, so we stapled ours together.

3. For the face, cut out a red “beard” and glue it under the folded bag bottom (i.e. inside the mouth).  Jo still thinks this is his tongue, I got tired of arguing with her…  once she started playing with it the “tongue” theory made it quite funny!

4. Cut out an orange triangle for the beak, white circles for the eyes, and black irises.  Use whatever glue you want, based on the type of paper/foam/felt your using.  We used basic elmer’s school glue and it took forever to dry.

5. Lay your tail down on the table, apply glue to the middle. Don’t drench it, but this is pretty heavy so be generous.  Lay your bag on top and press it onto the tail.

6. Allow ample time to dry.

Doodle Bug had a blast playing with a turkey on each hand.  She went in the other room and had long involved conversations with them.  Tader Bug (my baby) stole my turkey and with a bird on each hand she ran the hallway pretending she and the turkeys were flying!

Have fun! and Happy Thanksgiving!

Momma