The Basic Hiding Game

Objective

Practice subitizing—immediately recognizing and labeling small numbers and constructing a concept of one to three—and the concept of number constancy (rearranging items in a set does not change its total).

Materials:

·  Objects. Use a small set of identical objects early on and later advance to larger sets or sets of similar, but not identical, objects.

·  Box, cloth, or other item that can be used to hide the objects.

Directions:

With a small group of children, present one to three objects on a mat for a few seconds. Cover them with a cloth or box and then ask the children, “Who can tell me how many (name of objects) I am hiding?” After the children have answered, uncover the objects so that the objects can be seen. The children can count to check their answer, or the teacher can reinforce the answer by saying, for example, “Yes, two. See, there are two (objects) on the mat: one, two.” Continue the game with different numbers of objects arranged in different ways. Teachers can also tailor the Basic Hiding game for use with the whole class or individual children.

Early math areas covered:

·  Subitizing

·  Increasing magnitude up to five items

Monitoring children’s progress and tailoring the activity appropriately:

·  Vary the number of objects to determine whether children are ready to use larger sets.

·  If a child has difficulty, before covering the objects, ask the child how many items he or she sees. Then, cover the objects and ask again. For larger collections (greater than three), allow the child to check his or her answer by counting.

Integrating the activity into other parts of the day:

·  Consider playing the game at various points during the day with different sets of objects, including objects that are a part of children’s everyday experience (e.g., spoons and blocks).

Using the activity to increase math talk in the classroom:

·  Use both informal (“more” or “less”) and formal (“add” and “subtract”) language to describe changing the number of objects in the set.

From: Teaching Math to Young Children (November, 2013) NCEE 2014-4005 U.S. Department of Education