Sort It, and Count It, and Add It All Up!

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How many stars are there in the sky? How many fish swim in the sea? How many types of dinosaurs were there? When children are on this special ‘question asking spree’, adults can think of only one question ‘How many questions are you going to ask?’ ๐Ÿ˜…


Counting is the most basic mathematical concept that children develop at very early age. Toddlers, who do not know anything about counting, point out immediately if one candy goes missing from the handful. Children also understand that same objects can be classified into different groups based on some other characteristics. This is particularly visible when they resist putting ‘their’ chocolates with ‘others’ chocolates in the same category. Calvin’s cartoon shows this wonderfully!

 


 

And so it feels rather natural to introduce two-way classification as an extension of simple counting. We played this simple game with coloured (red, blue) buttons and muffin liners. Each muffin liner represents a team of red and blue players. The number of players ranges from 1 to 3 for each colour. And the teams are formed using the various combinations of these two types of players (as shown in the picture).

 


Our task is to sort these teams in different boxes based on the number of red and blue players. Before sorting, some explanation is generally required about what the boxes represent. Colour matching helped us to identify the numbers with either red or blue players. It is possible to have more than one teams in single box (This must be obvious for many, but still reiterated for completeness!). We placed them on top of each other. To initiate further discussion, we then removed the ‘teams’ from the boxes (one box at a time) and write down the number of teams in that place.

 


The last task in this exercise is to count the number of teams with 2 members, 3 members and so on. Easiest way to start this discussion is with 2-member teams, and then ask about possible ways to form 3-member and 4-member teams. You may think that primary going children as too young to answer. But, there is a strong chance that you will be pleasantly surprised!   


 

And here is one more FREE ACTIVITY for the Subscribers (shown in the first picture) about counting and two-way classification. ๐Ÿ˜‡๐Ÿ˜‡ 


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