Valentine Heart Math

Delaney has been working on memorizing her addition facts to 10, mostly with computer games and her dad and I randomly quizzing her throughout the day. I had bought some Valentine candy hearts for an art project, and decided that they would be great for an addition game, too. (Instead, really, because it appears that Cullen found them too, and there may not be enough left for my art project! :) )

I put a handful of hearts in some little bowls, and wrote numbers 0-10 on post-it notes, and made an extra post-it for numbers 2, 3, 4, & 5. Delaney put the numbers in order, and we began.

 Her job was to count the number of hearts in the bowl, and then make all of the post-it combinations she could to add up to that number.

 

 Once she found all of the addition facts for her number, she got to eat a treat, which is of course the real point of the game, right? ;)

I could adapt this game in many different ways...for beginning math, we could count the hearts and then find the correct number, add the hearts in the bowls and find the correct post-it answer... Delaney could do subtraction with the post-its, and find the bowl of hearts with the correct answer. Hearts are  good for many other graphing and sorting activities too, and there are LOTS of free printable resources online to facilitate these. 

Sophie helped a little too, "counting" the hearts.

 She also played with her dollhouse beside us, and got some love from the kitty, who enjoys school time also.

I did some color sorting with Sophie after Delaney and I finished. I laid out construction paper to match the hearts' colors. First, we reviewed colors, then she matched the hearts to the paper of the same color.

It was the first time that I had tried a structured sorting activity with her, and she needed a bit of help to get started, which Delaney was happy to provide.

"Here, Sister. What color is this? Now, where do you put it?"

And then, she finished on her own.

 

She was pretty pleased about eating a few treats afterward, too.

The post-it addition facts were excellent for helping Delaney learn all of the different ways to add up to a sum. I wanted to find another fun way for her to practice the addition facts other than me asking, "Delaney, what's 4+2" while she colors or eats. (Yesterday, she got tired of me asking her questions and said, "Um...I don't know, The number line in my head went on a trip. I think it's in Egypt.")

I did a Pinterest search for addition bingo and found lots of great free printables. We used this one yesterday, from www.mamaslearningcorner.com, because it has facts up to 12, and we will use this one from www.donnayoung.org in the future, because it has facts into the teens. (Both of these sites have tons of great ideas and printables on many other subjects, too.) We used our candy hearts for bingo markers, and the winner got to eat their bingo.