Cian absolutely loves playing with numbers. I can’t quite figure out whether it is his own natural interest, or whether it’s Finny’s influence. Either way, he spends days role playing Numberblocks regardless of whether his brothers are around or at school.

Resources

Method

Finny very excitedly set up this tray for Cian. He based it on the very first episode of Numberblocks, called “One”.

“One, one bird. Hello, bird! One, one tree. Hello, tree! One wonderful world, and one me!“

“One ant. Hello, ant! One bee. Hello, bee! One wonderful world, and one me!“

As he was playing, he asked for, “Song on, peeees!”

“One sun in the sky. One boat on the sea. One wonderful world, and one me.

One whale swimming by. One surfing chimpanzee? One wonderful world, and one me.“

As the song continued, he counted on one finger. I missed the start of the phrase on the video, but I caught him while he still had his one finger up.

“When you start to count, I’m the right amount. I’m the first in line. You can count on me, I’m one in a million. I’m one of a kind! Oh, one, one blanket.”

“But I’m number one and I’m winning, I’m only at the beginning. I could be the start of something, maybe I could be part of something bigger. One mountain to climb. One step at a time. One horse in this race. One smile on my face.“

Finny acted out the end of the song, where he was able to showcase his writing of ‘ONE WUNDRFUL WURLD’.

“One gate, one goal, one goose, one goat. One cap, one cow, one cake, one cat. One hole, one hop, one hen, one hat.

One wonderful, beautiful view as far as the eye can see. One wonderful world, One wonderful world, One wonderful world, and one me!I am One! That was fun!”

Cian’s bee, then bird, kept flying away.

The animals all took it in turns riding on the surf board and the boat.

Cian tried the tiny hat on his head, then on the chicken.

Numberblock One and the bird both hopped on and off the boat, while the surfing chimpanzee kept falling off his surfboard.

Then he went back to playing with the bee and the whale.

DfES Early Years Outcomes (2013)

Mathematics

Number – 8 to 20 months

  • Develops an awareness of number names through their enjoyment of action rhymes and songs that relate to their experience of numbers.
  • Has some understanding that things exist, even when out of sight.

Number – 16 to 26 months

  • Knows that things exist, even when out of sight.
  • Beginning to organise and categorise objects, e.g. putting all the teddy bears together or teddies and cars in separate piles.
  • Says some counting words randomly.

Number – 22 to 36 months

  • Selects a small number of objects from a group when asked, for example, ‘please give me one’, ‘please give me two’.
  • Recites some number names in sequence.
  • Creates and experiments with symbols and marks representing ideas of number.
  • Begins to make comparisons between quantities.