Founder of Sharp and Sassy : Sally Sharp
My child watches TV and I feel very guilty about it! I try to encourage educational content, but she says “it’s boring” so I put on cartoons on TG4 to help her ear with Gaeilge. That worked a treat until she figured out how to use the remote and switched to Paw Patrol or Spidey when my back was turned! It’s hard to do it all and I have to remember to give myself a break because parenting is hard but then I feel guilty about feeling guilty about letting my daughter watch TV and it’s just a vicious circle!
I don’t think I’m the only one that feels this way, or at least I hope I’m not! To alleviate my guilt, one thing I try to do every day is carve out time to play together, being completely present with no screens, including phones! It could be a couple of hours, or it might only be 15 minutes depending on the day’s schedule but it all counts!
My daughter, Nessa, has great fun playing these games and I feel happier knowing that they are educational and teaching her new skills. All the activity packs I create for Sharp and Sassy are actually inspired by the games I play with Nessa and although I do reference Know Your Numbers below, I give examples of how you can do these activities using items you likely already have around your home!
We’ve recently been focusing on counting and other simple maths so here are 10 games that I play with my daughter to help her comprehend and use numbers in her daily life.
1. Playing Shop
Shop is a perfect game that can be made simple or complex depending on the age of your child. My daughter received a toy till and play money for her birthday a couple of years ago and she will turn anything and everything into a shop! She would take the tins, packets and boxes out of my kitchen and line them up for me to buy in her shop. I got a little tired of constantly having to reorganise my kitchen so she now has her own toy foods and I cleared some space for her “shop shelves”. We kept it simple at first and using her play money, it would be one coin or note for one item so she would have to count the items I wanted to buy and then we would count the coins.
As your child gets used to this, you can step up the difficulty a notch and put different prices on items e.g. a banana is €1, tin of tomatoes is €2, and a chicken is €3. Keep the total price under the maximum number your child can count to. For example, a banana, tin of tomatoes and the chicken would be €6 which is a sum that Nessa would be able to do as she’s not confident counting over 10 but as she learns, I’ll increase the total price to €15 or €20.
So far, we’ve kept all coins and notes equating to €1 but now we’re starting to try to use coins for their actual value- but this is a bit more complex and currently hit and miss as to whether she gets it right. See my game below with the magnets shapes to help her understand the different monetary values.
2. Matching The Numbers
Nessa has been able to count for a couple of years now, but she struggles with associating the value with the digit, as in she knows 2+2=4, but couldn’t pick out the numbers 2 and 4 when written down. I created Know Your Numbers to help her with this issue. Each digit has the corresponding number of dots within it so I’ll ask her where’s number 5, and she will guess and then she counts the dots to see if she’s right. I will guess numbers as well, but I’ll often guess wrong to help her confidence because she will then help me figure out the right answer.
The Know Your Numbers pack is A5 size and fits perfectly in my handbag, so this is one of the things we’ll play out and about if we’re having to wait for something or if I have to create a distraction if she’s getting fractious.
Another way to play this at home is with a pack of playing cards. I would advise writing the number 1 on the ace to avoid confusion and then lay out one suit e.g. diamonds, 1-10 and then you can ask where’s number 8 and you count the diamonds on the card to see if you’re correct!
3. What’s My Age Again?
This is a very simple game that only needs your fingers to count! We have a lot of friends and family with children and we count to the year of their age, so for example, Nessa recently turned 4 and I will ask “how many years since you were a baby?” and she’ll count 1, 2, 3, 4. One of her cousins is 6 and I ask the same question and she will count 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. It’s a very simple game but each time she counts and the repetition means that she learns counting without even realising it! We go through her cousins, friends and even the animals ages!
4. Count & Gather
For this game, you’ll need baskets or bowls laid out for items to be placed in, though you could just use some pieces of paper to put things on.
Count & Gather helps with counting but also encourages learning to identify other things like colours, shapes, animals, letters etc. It’s very simple you lay out the baskets and say you need to get X number of Y items so for example:
- 1 x Thing that is orange
- 2 x Things that are red
- 3 x Things that are green
When they get bored of colours, you can mix it up and ask for things related to what they are learning for example:
- 5 x Things that begin with the letter T
- 6 x Things that are shiny
- 7 x Things that are square
- 8 x Things that are soft
- 9 x Things that you can wear
- 10 x Things that you can write with (I use this one when there’s lots of missing crayons & colours as it’s cleaning up without her realising!)
You can use as many or as little baskets as you like depending on their age and capabilities.
My daughter hates tidying up so sometimes this game will help get her started cleaning. By putting 10 green blocks, 10 crayons and 10 teddies with clothes back into each of their correct boxes when you have a carpet of toys it becomes like a treasure hunt! Then it might be 10 blue blocks, 10 colouring pencils and 10 teddies that look like animals (She has a 3 foot tall laundry basket of teddies!) to find next and the more she picks up, the tidier it becomes so that when it’s time to “glan suas” there’s not that much left on the floor.
5. Cooking!
Now, I will admit, cooking with a littlun is not for the faint of heart and does take a fair amount of patience when you first start! The first few times, you need to do a bit of prep but soon enough, you’ll have a helper, and it won’t feel nearly as daunting!
I used to get very stressed (with a side of guilt) trying to keep Nessa occupied and out of the way while I cooked the dinner before I realised actually including her in the process is much more productive. Yes, it takes a little bit longer, but it is quality time together. She is happier and I’m not pulled in different directions, and it has become one of our favourite things to do! Nessa has about 4 recipes that she could nearly make herself if only I’d let her work the cooker!
This would probably be easier with a set of American cup measurers, otherwise you can do what I do which is have one scoop that you use, rinse, repeat! Counting the scoops means that she’s using her numbers in real life while also learning the valuable life skill of cooking.
For example, Nessa loves savoury pancakes for dinner. I use a very simple recipe that is just flour, milk, an egg and then we add things like cheese and ham. When we first started, I would get things set up putting an egg on a ceramic plate, pouring the correct amount of milk needed into a jug and weighing the flour out in a separate bowl on the side. (Now though she’s able to pretty much do it all herself without me doing any prep)
Top Insta tip I discovered was for her to drop the egg from about a foot above a ceramic plate and it usually cracks perfectly but if there’s any shell, it’s easy to pick out. She then counts the scoops of milk and flour pouring them into the mixing bowl and whisks it together and I take over the cooking part. Nessa will then happily watch me pour the mixture into the pan and when I flip it over, she sprinkles the filling on one side. We will then do some maths for example, if she has one pancake and daddy and mammy have two pancakes each, how many do we need to cook? Then she does the subtraction as well i.e. I’ve cooked 3 pancakes so how many more do I have to cook to make 5.
Similarly, we make cakes and cupcakes with her counting everything out and for dinner, when I need to add dried seasonings, we read (sound out) the names of garlic, onion, paprika etc and she’ll spoon it into the pot. Having my daughter help me with the cooking has honestly removed so much stress from trying to get her to stay out of the kitchen and who knows in another few years, maybe she’ll take over and I can put my feet up!
6. Writing Numbers
Managing pen control is something that takes practice and having something to trace helps children while they are learning their numbers and letters. In the Know Your Numbers activity pack, there is a wipeable & reusable worksheet to help children with writing their numbers. Obviously, a simple alternative is you can also just get a pen and paper and write all the numbers down and your child and write over it. If your child is like mine, just writing will not excite them so to make the game more fun, get a dice and roll it. They count the dots and that’s the number they trace.
Now obviously a dice only goes to 6 so here’s where you can sneak a little more maths into the game… when 1-4 have all been traced, you add 4 to whatever number you get i.e. roll a 4, they have to add 4 and then trace the number 8 or roll a 6, add 4 and you have to write 10 etc. (You can use the dotted number worksheet to help with the sum.)
This game is simple but effective as counting the dots on the dice and then associating the value to the written number on the worksheet helps to reinforce the connection with the digit.
7. Simple Maths
This is another activity from the Know Your Numbers activity pack, however you can write your own sums with a pen and paper and give your child playing cards to count the numbers and it will have the same effect. Start with addition as that is easier than subtraction. There’s a bag with two sets of numbers from 1-10. (If your child can only count to 10, then remove numbers 6-10 from the bag until they can count to 20.)
Your child reaches into the bag and takes 2 numbers and sticks them to the worksheet. Similar to the other worksheet, each number contains the corresponding number of dots within it so your child can add them all up to get the answer and write it in the in the box.
It may be they want to practice tracing the number first before copying it freehand in the answer box. Again, the more they write the number after finishing the sum, the more they will associate the value with the digit. When they’ve finished the sum, peel off the numbers and choose some more from the bag and repeat!
Once your child has gained confidence with the addition worksheet, and is ready for a bigger challenge, introduce the subtraction worksheet. It works in the exact same way but obviously is more difficult to take away as it’s counting backwards.
Adding in a shameless plug here, but I also have Tables Activity Packs with reusable & wipeable worksheets for addition and multiplication for the 12 Tables along with an answer book!
8. Playing Cards
We’re back to my trusty favourite, a pack of playing cards! Keeping it simple, shuffle the cards and get your child to separate them into 1-10. (As mentioned earlier, I would advise you write 1 on the ace cards).
Depending on the age of your child will depend on how challenging you make it. You could start off with the cards of one suit laid out and your child then has a starting point to just match the cards as they come up.
Adding a little more difficulty, you could write 1-10 on a sheet of paper marking where to place the cards or to step up the challenge further, they have to place the cards in the correct order of 1-10 without any assistance.
You can also turn this into a game if you have a couple of children. Split the pack or give them a pack each and see who finishes first, or have them work together to match all the suits within the different packs; so for example Charlie’s got to match his 1-10 clubs with Mary’s 1-10 clubs while Mary is trying to match her 1-10 diamonds to Charlie’s pack. They keep going until both packs of cards are matched into pairs.
As your child start to learn about odd and even numbers, you can change it up again and ask them to match all suits but put a red card on top for odd numbers or a black card on top for even numbers.
A couple of packs of cards is honestly the best thing to have in your bag because it’ll keep all ages amused, and if the kids are asleep, you can set up a game of solitaire for yourself!
9. Shapes & Values
This game is a little more challenging and is actually inspired by those viral maths memes that you find on social media. I use the square and triangle magnet tiles, but you can use anything that has different shapes- even money! – just so long as it’s visually different to represent different values.
Let’s say a square magnet tile is worth 1 and a triangle magnet tile is worth 2, you grab a pile of different shapes, and you must count and figure out who has the highest number. Sorry to keep mentioning this, but my daughter uses the Know Your Numbers dot worksheet to help with the counting as this game is a bit of a challenge for her.
I’ve been using this game as a way to help her understand the differences with the value of money and it does seem to be helping her when we transfer the analogy playing shop. She is slowly grasping the concept of the difference between a €1 coin and a €2 coin. We’ll probably incorporate €5 and €10 notes before going into the smaller cents as you obviously have to know up to 100 e.g. if something is €6.95, and you give a tenner, €3.05 is harder to figure out than if it was €7 and you get €3 change.
I know a lot of people say she’s still very young to be dealing with money, but right now it’s all still a game to her. I just try to incorporate the groundwork for real life skills into the games we play so that she’s learning through osmosis.
10. Building Blocks
This one is super simple and I’m sure everyone does it, but I’m including as simple works! We will build towers and count the blocks to see how tall we can get them. Counting regularly and repeating the numbers help little minds learn!
I’ll also set challenges of building towers of 2 high with red blocks, 6 high with green blocks, 10 high with yellow blocks etc and it helps with colours but again counting and the visualisation of how big or small the number is. It’s also just fun to create and build and see where their imagination takes them such as creating a rainbow stegosaurus!
I think the key for teaching children who don’t enjoy sitting down to learn is creating opportunities within your daily life to make things a game, or allowing a child to be helpful and involved, or it can just be as simple as asking them how many green cars are in the car park! Make these games and questions part of your routine and soon enough you won’t even realise that you’re doing it, and your child is learning while having a lot of fun!
If you’re looking for fun and educational activity ideas, follow @sharp_and_sassy_shop on Instagram or browse the products on the website www.sharpandsassy.ie
