If there’s one thing you would have noticed during the past year of homeschooling, it’s how your child learns everything more easily, quickly, and clearly through play.
So if you are trying to help your toddler learn numbers, counting, and a host of other age-appropriate skills, this week’s co create activity is perfect for you!
This activity is called a Honey Bee Ten Frame and will help your child gain a visual and concrete understanding of numbers. It is designed by Anushikha Bansal, a DIY blogger and a homeschooling mom to 3-year-old Atharv.
To complement the season, this activity is designed around the beautiful, buzzing honey bee! Ready to collect some honey?
Benefits of the Honey Bee Ten Frame
This game is an easy and effective tool to teach your little one counting. It’s various benefits include:
1. Early math Skills - Playing with this frame will help your child visualise numbers and quantity. It will also help them subitize, or look at a small number of objects and tell how many are there without counting.
2. Fine motor Skills - Moving the pieces as they play will hone their fine motor skills.
3. Coordination and awareness - Placing the bees on the cardboard and moving the numbers around will sharpen their hand eye coordination and spatial awareness.
4. Cognitive Development - Apart from numbers, counting, and math, this game is also a great opportunity to teach your child about bees, beehives, and how honey is made.
5. Concentration - Figuring the right answer and matching the numbers and bees will develop your child’s ability to concentrate and focus for longer periods of time.
Creating the Frame
Age group:
This activity can be enjoyed by children between 2.5 to 5 years.
Material Required:
1. A large piece of cardboard
2. Cardboard cutter/scissors
3. Colouring pen
4. Honey bee print cutouts (alternatively, you can also use pompoms, blocks, counter coins, popsicle sticks, or anything else that your child would love!)
How to create the frame:
1. Draw a honeycomb with 10 slots on the cardboard (or you can make it a regular 2/5 rectangular frame).
2. Cut each individual comb with the cutter.
3. Make similarly shaped number counters and colour and mark them with numbers from 1 to 10 (or use existing number counters from any learning material).
Playing with the Honey Bee Ten Frame
Learning numbers: Pick a number counter and encourage your child to identify the number. You could challenge them further by asking which number comes before and after the one they have just picked.
Counting bees: Once your child has learnt to identify the numbers, ask them to pick a number, and count and place the subsequent number of bees on the honeycomb ten frame. Start with smaller numbers and work your way up.
Simple math: Once your child is comfortable with number and counting, you could introduce basic math such as addition and subtraction. Use the bees as a visual example to demonstrate how it works.
Get to know the honey bee: You could even tell your child about the honey bee with some interesting facts that are sure to grab their attention! Some fun facts about bees include:
- Bees have 5 eyes and 6 legs!
- Honey bees harvest nectar and pollen from flowering plants.
- Male bees in the hive are called drones and they do not have a stinger.
- Honey bees live in large groups called colonies.
- An average beehive can hold around 50,000 bees!
We hope you’ve enjoyed this activity. If you would like to share your experience playing with this frame, tag us at #CoCreatewithshumee. Stay home and stay safe!
Anushikha Bansal is a DIY blogger and the co-creator of #noprepkidsactivity. You can follow her @toddler_ed on Instagram.