Summer Counting Mats for Toddlers and Preschoolers
Inside: Summer counting mats for toddlers and preschoolers.
If you're looking for a way to keep your toddler occupied this summer, look no further than my summer counting mats for toddlers! They are great for developing fine motor skills and have colorful designs that will interest any child—even those not yet reading.
My summer counting mat printable is great for preschoolers learning about numbers.
You can use counting mats for them to do their own math and add up the shapes on each mat. It's not only a great way for them to learn how to count, but it is something different and more exciting than doing school work.
I love how perfect these are for summer, with all summery things like seashells, the sun, and sand dollars.
Welcome to day 6 of my 10 Days of Summer Printables for Preschoolers! If you're interested in grabbing the other days, feel free to click the link and go back and grab them all.
You will be pleasantly surprised how many amazing sets we are giving away, and you can check out the rest of the bloggers who are also giving away products, or talking about summer learning.
It's all in that link, so go ahead and click over if you're interested, it's also linked at the very bottom of this post for your convenience.
First things first: Grab a book from our list of top ocean books for preschoolers to take these counting mats to the next level!
Let's get to it!
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What you'll need to get started on your counting mats for preschoolers:
I recommend getting everything together well before you bring your child to this printable. Kids always get a little crazy when they are excited about something –like a super cool and colorful play dough mat that will help them with counting! So you want to make sure that little excited human isn't left to sit in their excitement while you go find the play dough.
So many things can happen haha!
Let's keep that chaos out of our life and just prepare this ahead of time. I like to print everything the night before, laminate them, and have the play dough ready to go before we start.
Here is the list of everything you need.
-The free printables (OF COURSE!) grab it here:
–A laminator– You want to keep these printables around as long as you can, so I recommend laminating the pages so you can get the most use out of them. This is ESPECIALLY true for play dough mats because it will ruin the paper if you put play dough on it. So don't skip this step!
–Play Dough– I love letting them use play dough to sculp the number, as well as create other little creations on their page. The play doh I linked to here is PERFECT for ocean play dough mats, look at the colors! Click through and see, they're so pretty!
PIN for later:
Prepare Your Summer Play Dough Mat Printable:
-gather supplies
-laminate all the pages — this is important don't forget to laminate!
-Get out play dough, and create!
How to use Summer Counting Mats for Preschoolers Printable
I created these with the intention of using them with play dough, however I love what my children have done with them. The used little erasers and placed them in the ten frames to count with them.
I let my kids take the lead with this one, and tell me what they'd like to create, or how they want to play. We talk about the numbers, and also talk about different ways to create the number.
Summer Counting Mats For Toddlers – Made Easier
You can make these work younger kids, you can talk about the pictures, is that a sand dollar? How many star fish do you see? This way you can talk about all of the numbers .
I also like to mix them all up, and have your child pick out a sheet, then talk about what it says. Can your child identify the number represented? Can they count how many they see?
Adapt Summer Counting Mats For Preschoolers – Made Harder
After you laminate, you can cut these pages apart so they numbers and the ten frame are apart, and have your child put them together.
You can also use the separate pieces to create math problems that your child will need to solve. These pages go up to ten, so it's easy to print them all out twice if you'd like to do doubles, like 4 + 4.
Other Ways to Learn with Printable Counting Mats
Another way to learn with these printables is talking about each number.
What is the name of this number?
Can you count to this number?
What happens if you add one to this number, what would that look like?
What Will Kids Learn?
Number recognition is so important for preschoolers, because it's something they'll need in kindergarten– and the rest of their life, right?
There is no rush on these things, so let your child explore and find fun ways to interact with numbers in their every day life. This printable is a great step in keeping numbers in front of your child.
Get the Printable Here
Be sure you check out our full collection of summer themed printables in the shop!
The thing I love about printables for preschoolers is how it helps them use their ands to interact with letters, numbers, and shapes.
I love when they can cut up papers, or squish play doh between their fingers.
I began this journey to create more for my preschooler so I could keep him occupied without putting a screen in front of his face.
It was so tempting, and so easy, so I decided to start making things, so these printables were MORE easy, and MORE tempting.
I like bright colors and fun art on them, so you will be sure to get that from all of my printables. I'm glad you're here, and I hope you love what you see, and come back for more, it would mean the world to me.
For more free printables this week, be sure to check out this post with links to all of the freebies.
