Hellobee

Drake has always liked numbers, counting and now adding and subtracting. These skills are obviously important as he grows, and I’m glad that he has a keen interest in numbers and math at his young age (since clearly he didn’t inherit these traits from his mom). I want him to see math and learning as fun; it might not always be possible, but at his age everything can be exciting. I wanted to find some toys that encouraged math development while still engaging his young pre-school mind. This is what I found:

1) Inchimals – I have been eyeing this toy for some time now, and I think this Christmas Drake might be getting it courtesy of his grandmother. Drake has been very interested in the idea of size and measurement these days; he asks how tall things are and compares his height to things. Inchimals are small rulers with different animals depicted on each one, which of course helps my cause since Drake is 100% animal crazy. I have read reviews where children use the rulers to measure everything, as well as add the rulers together and work on addition.

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3) Alfie – I have blogged a little about Alfie in the past as I had him as a toy as a child and immensely enjoyed him. Alfie has undergone a makeover since I was young, but the concept is still the same. It’s an educational toy with rotating cards with questions for your child to answer by pushing the buttons on the side of his body. He offers encouragement and is engaging and silly with robotic inspired jokes and humor. Alfie comes with a letter set but has an expansion pack for math, music, more letters, and foods. Alfie and some expansion packs was a gift from my mother a few years ago, and Drake plays happily with them all. The math pack deals with counting, sequence, basic adding & subtraction, and patterns.

4) Hot Dots Pre-K Math – Drake picked out this Hot Dots set along with the letter one for his past birthday. The toy is easy enough — there is a dog pen that corresponds to flash cards with questions that you answer by tapping the right dot. The dog will respond to correct and incorrect answers. Drake will often will play with it by himself when Juliet is napping or I’m cooking dinner. He sometimes needs help with understanding what the card is asking, but since he plays with it so often he usually figures it out on his own. I like that it’s educational, but also something he can do on his own without much assistance. The counting, adding, and subtracting questions are geared for his age group.

5) Counting Rods – I am lucky in that Drake is a child who can sit at the table and play with toys like this by himself. He often will sit and do puzzles, color, and play games like the Hot Dot cards without much supervision, so I think a toy like this would work well for his personality. The rods are simple and show basic math as you count to see how many there are when you add and subtract. I like this set as it also has multiplication and division tiles which can be used later to continue teaching Drake more advanced math as he grows. I think this basic set is a great introductory tool to help teach math in a very visual hands-on way.

6) Monkey Math – Drake’s math journey actually began with the Monkey Math Sunshine School app I blogged about here. Drake still plays it from time to time on my phone and when I saw this monkey game, I thought it looked very similar to the monkey on the app. It’s a simple game that teaches addition by balancing the sides. If the math is incorrect the sides will be tipped, showing the idea of balanced weights and equal parts.

7) UmiZoomi MobiGo Game – Team UmiZoomi is a wonderful show on Nick Jr dedicated to math, counting, patterns, sorting, shapes, etc. Drake received a MobiGo for his last birthday and it’s a great handheld toy with lots of playing options built in. You can also buy additional games (or download them) for the system. Drake loves watching UmiZoomi and since they are so math geared this game would be a perfect addition to his Mobi.

8) Chutes & Ladders – I was hunting around for Christmas presents when I stumbled on this classic game that I remember from my own childhood. The board is labeled from 1- 100 as you make your way from the bottom to the top trying to hit all the ladders and avoid the chutes. You also roll the dice and move accordingly along the numbers. I can see having Drake roll the dice and then asking him to try to use addition to guess where his next place would be. The same could go for subtracting when he falls down a chute. Granted this might be a bit more advanced for him once we get out of the teens, but even now it can help him solidify recognizing which numbers are bigger and smaller and counting to 100. I played this game all the time as a child since it was so simple in concept, and I was probably learning math without even realizing it!

9) Hi Ho Cherry O – Here is another classic board game geared toward counting. I also remember this one as a child, spinning the spinner and trying to be the fastest cherry picker. There are numerous ways to use math in this game from counting how many cherries are on the tree after you remove some, counting all the cherries and seeing how many everyone ends up with at the end of the game, working as a team and adding up the cherries you collected, etc.