Early Numeracy: Counting songs

Mr Sociable is really interested in counting at the moment. I think they have been doing lots of counting and counting songs at Prep. The other day he randomly just started counting while he was playing with his drums and counted to 39! (He did leave out 15, but otherwise, he did pretty well).

Songs are a great way to practise early counting skills. Some songs teach counting forwards (eg Dr Knickerbocker), others count backwards (eg 10, 9, 8, God is Great!). I started making a list of all the kids counting songs I could think of. This is what I came up with:

Counting forwards

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, Once I caught a fish alive

Dr Knickerbocker

One potato, two potato

This Old Man

1, 2 Buckle My Shoe

1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (Five Fingers on my Hand - Peter Combe)

One Grey Elephant Balancing

Counting Backwards

10, 9, 8, God is Great

10 in the bed

5 little speckled frogs

10 green bottles

5 little joeys/5 little monkeys

6 little ducks

Alice the Camel

Can you think of more? 

Ideas for teaching counting songs
1. Using puppets, toys or foam shapes to represent the characters in the song makes the song fun! It also allows kids to get involved in the "story" of the song and teaches them to represent numbers with objects. Mr Sociable played with some foam frogs and a stick today, singing 5 Speckled Frogs (he actually sang for us at the dinner table, while waiting for everyone else to finish).

2. Teaching kids to use their fingers while counting is good practise for addition and subtraction (eg take away one finger for each verse of 5 Speckled Frogs as the frogs jump off the log).

3. Reading books that illustrate these counting songs. Mr Fun loves to look at books while I sing. Mr Sociable likes to "read" this sort of book to Mr Fun too. If you don't have any of these books, you could write your own - just put one verse of the song on each page and draw a matching picture (or use foam shapes).


Do you remember singing these songs as a child? Do you sing them with your kids?

I made a dress!

It's been 10-15 years since I attempted making a dress (after a failed attempt in high school). But, I saw a pretty summer dress in a sewing book Franky gave me for Christmas and decided to have a go.

From Sew La Tea Do, by Pip Lincolne, p. 51

I used some curtains that my Mum gave me (yes, my darling sister, very Sound of Music). The straps took me a while to fold/iron/sew, but the rest of the dress was easy!

It's a little baggier than I expected, but I'm still pretty happy :) I learnt some new skills & now I'm feeling braver about sewing another dress!

What new projects have you tried lately?

I've been reading: The Christ Files

Since having kids, my reading habits have totally changed. It takes me so much longer to finish books, because it's much harder to multi-task while reading a book! I used to read mostly fiction, whereas now I mainly read non-fiction.

Recently, I've been reading The Christ Files (John Dickson, 2006). It's a short book (101 pages), so I've actually finished it in a couple of weeks! It's a book aimed at people who are interested in the history of Jesus - how do historians learn about Jesus and the context he lived in? It is not written just for Christians, but is aimed at anyone who is interested in the historical basis of Christianity.

Image from here

I studied Ancient History as uni (actually, it was one of my majors), but it has all faded into a distant memory. I've enjoyed this book, as it reminded me about how the methods of history can be applied to Jesus. It was faith-building to read the historical facts about Jesus that can be agreed upon by scholars. Dickson explains the range of historical evidence that informs us about Jesus, such as ancient Jewish & Graeco-Roman historians, archaeology and the Christian gospel accounts. He details some of the historical facts we can (and cannot) learn from these sources.

This book is a helpful (and approachable) read for anyone who wants to find out more about the historical evidence for Jesus and the way that historians arrive at their conclusions. Dickson doesn't write like he is trying to "sell" Christianity, but is honest about the limitations of history:

"In what follows I intend to keep within the bounds not only of the historically 'possible', but also the truly plausible. 'Certainty', by the way, cannot really be achieved in the study of history. Virtually nothing about the past can be proven in the mathematical sense. Historical evidence allows us to talk about probabilities rather than certainties. In many ways, it is like legal evidence. 'Beyond reasonable doubt' does not mean certain; it means that a particular conclusion is so well supported by the evidence that to doubt it, or to insist on an alternative explanation, is unreasonable...
At times my approach in this book will mean I have to be circumspect about things I actually believe to be true. For instance, when I mention Jesus' reported miracles, readers will notice that I make no attempt to prove Jesus did in fact heal the sick, restore sight to the blind and so on. This is not because I do not accept these things; it is simply because I think historical sources are incapable of proving (or disproving) things like healings." (pp. 14-15)