Early mathematics, DIY

Adelaide has a new work, which she loves! Dot cards, place the chestnut (those chestnuts we picked last year are proving to be useful) on the dot. And then, if you want to, you can count them too. Adelaide is counting here. :)

All the credits to my homeschooling course, of course, where I learnt so much and can clearly see now, at what stage Adelaide is in each area.

When it comes to math, I thought that we aren't really doing anything yet. Sure, counting, casually, as it's a normal part of life. Adelaide was around 1,5 years old, so almost a year ago, when I suddenly realized, that she understands the concept of "two", she could count the two rocks in her hand, for example. And I remember, that she didn't understand "three" then yet.

Well now she knows "three", and sometimes she surprises us, bringing us 5 pencils and saying, that she brought "five". More or less, she is counting and is comfortable in the range of 1 to 5, today she counted also 6. (She attempts more, until 10 maybe, but then it's not in the correct order usually.)
And I have made this work at a totally perfect moment. Yesterday, suddenly, maybe because we have tried to count even more with her, she started counting everything. Her buttons, her books.. Everything!

And today she liked doing this a lot and was placing the chestnuts quite precisely. When they're placed, she counts them sometimes, if she wants to, but I don't push it at all.
My goal here is not to make her count or teach her numbers (she doesn't know any numbers by the look of them). It's just to practice this dot-object correspondence (and she visually unknowingly takes in these different numbers).

What did we do before this? Just casual counting, and one-to-one correspondence (placing one item in one certain place, I think we have had this covered for a while), and many sorting games.

When it comes to numbers, that people might be teaching other children of this age or even younger, we are not rushing with those at all, as Montessori suggests to wait with those abstract concepts. We are probably going to teach her number symbols, when she will show interest in them herself, which might not be for another year or so. Who knows. So far she hasn't really ever asked, if there is a number seen somewhere, like in a book. (Same with letters, she hasn't expressed any interest in letters, so we are not teaching her any letters yet.)

And when it comes to geometry, then there too - she has had some shape sorters, and we are naming shapes casually, as they are around us, and sometimes drawing them, either in the sand, or anywhere else. And she has expressed interest in shapes lately, she knows and likes to draw "circles", as well as "half-circles", and also triangles (which are sometimes hard to recognize, but she is actually attempting to draw the 3 corners).