Sung to the tune of the "Hokey Pokey", this song tells all there is to know about young children and flannel boards. Kids love playing with flannel boards, moving items on and off, singing songs, counting the items and talking about what they're doing.

      Many of us use flannel boards for language activities, but overlook this useful tool when planning for math. Yet kids will automatically count flannel board figures with only the slightest bit of encouragement. Show them how to count from left to right and from top to bottom, touching each figure as they say its number, and they'll count the items you are already using with stories: the three bears with their bowls, spoons, chairs and beds; the cookies in Red Riding Hood's basket and the raisins on the Ginger Bread Man.

      Many teachers use familiar finger plays to introduce math skills of counting up, counting down, and ordinal numbers. Most of these rhymes adapt well to flannel board activities. To find a variety of adaptable rhymes, ask your librarian to direct you to books of finger rhymes in the children's section of the library.

Counting Up

      Lots of familiar finger rhymes add one character at the end of each verse. When you provide felt figures for these rhymes' characters, children can "count up", adding by one as they recite the rhymes and play with the figures at the flannel board.

(Continue adding kitten figures and counting up until you run out of figures.)

Counting Down

      In other familiar rhymes, a character leaves at the end of each verse, and children count down, or subtract by one as the rhyme continues. For the familiar rhyme about teddy bears jumping on the bed, cut out simple teddy bear shapes. Add eyes with a fine line, permanent marking pen. Place a rectangle of colorful felt on the board for the bed. If you wish, you can use Aileen's Tacky Glue (in a brown bottle, and available where craft supplies are sold) to attach contrasting shapes of felt to the rectangle to make it look like a quilt.

      Have children count the correct number of bears onto the quilt. Students will be "counting down" each time a bear falls off the bed. Reinforce that learning by counting bears between each verse.

      Similar rhymes abound about ghosts, pumpkins, snowmen, hearts, and fish, and all of these are easy to illustrate.

Counting and Comparing Numbers

      Songs are another source of flannel board ideas. Sing about Old MacDonald. From felt, cut out outline shapes of animals on his farm and put them on the board as you sing about each animal. Count all of the animals at the end of each verse, noticing that there are more animals than the last time you counted.

      You can have more than one of some animals - perhaps two cats, four cows and three pigs. (You'll have to adjust the song's verses: "Old MacDonald had four cows, E-I-E-I-O.) Have children practice comparison skills by counting just the cows then just the pigs. Discuss which group has more and/or less.

Seriation

      Use an enlarging/reducing copy machine to make several different-sized duplicates of a pattern. Cut these from felt. Watch your children practice seriation, another math skill, as they arrange the felt pieces in order from largest to smallest or smallest to largest. Encourage them to use words like larger, smaller, taller, shorter, narrower and wider.

Shapes

      Cut a variety of shapes in different sizes. Use many different colors of felt. Help children learn the names of circles, squares, triangles, ovals, hexagons, diamonds and trapezoids.

      Place the shapes at the flannel board and make them available during center time so children can explore them. They'll learn how several shapes fit together to make something else. Two matching triangles form a diamond. A triangle and a circle make an ice cream cone.

Matching; Sorting; Classifying

      Cut at least two of each shape, size and color so children can match items. Encourage them to sort/classify by color, size or shape. As their skill grows, they'll begin to classify by two attributes, putting the large blue shapes together and the small yellow shapes in another place.

Time Concepts

      Because time is such an abstract concept, it's difficult for children to understand it, but we can help them become aware of the passage of time. Use the flannel board to "count down" to a special activity like a field trip. Several school days before the trip, count on the calendar how many days until that day. Place that number of triangles on the flannel board. Each day during your large group meeting, have a child remove one triangle and have all children count the remaining days until the event. On the eventful day, a child removes the final triangle. "No more days until our field trip! We are going today."

Creating Flannel Board Figures

      Creating flannel board figures is easy. Sketch a simple figure on paper, cut that out, then pin it to felt as a pattern. Coloring books are a good source of "patterns". Remember that copying picture book illustrations without permission is a copyright violation. Instead, use picture book illustrations to spark your own ideas for flannel board figures.

      As time passes, your children will show you more and more uses for the flannel board. Follow their lead while they're having fun, and you'll discover together the many ways children can learn math while using a flannel board.

Read Happy Holiday Parties or go back to the article list.