Activity that supports Cognitive Development Concept Covered: 1. Counting (rote counting) 2. Identify objects based on color 3.

Group by color Age of child: 3 years old Standards: According to The Virginia Foundation Blocks: Strand 1 Sub-Strand A. Number and Operations, children 48 months and older are learning to develop an increasing ability to count in sequence and to use one-to one correspondence. Learning Objectives: After this lesson the child should be able to consistently count to 10, identify objects by color, and group objects based on color. Materials Needed: 1 green toy car 2 orange toy car 4 red toy cars 1 yellow toy car 1 black/brown/gray cars 1 blue toy cars Table that can accommodate the activity Chairs to accommodate both the child and caregiver Strategies: Part 1: I will ask the child to come sit at the table. The 10 colored toy cars (see materials needed) will be scattered around the table. I will ask the child to help her count how many cars are on the table. We will count to 10 together. I will then place the toy cars in a straight line on the table. I will again ask the child to count how many toy cars are on the table. At this time the child should respond by saying 10. I will say, If I take one car away, now how many cars do we have? I will repeat this several times, removing different amounts of toy cars and asking the child to count how many are left. Part 2: I will keep the toy cars on the table. I will then ask the child to put all the red toy cars to designated spot on the table. I will repeat this action for the other colored toy cars. Once all of the toy cars are grouped together according to color, I will ask the child to count how many toy cars are in each color group. When I ask how many toy cars are in the green group, he should respond one. When I ask how many toy cars are in the blue group, he should respond 1, and so on. Assessment: (How will I determine the extent to which the child grasped the concept? What evidence will I collect to indicate that the objectives were met?) If the child successfully counted how many toys cars were present during Part 1, while correctly counting the number of toys cars within each color group during Part 2, than he understands the concept of rote counting 1-10. If the child successfully grouped the toy cars according to color during Part 2 of this activity, then the child understands the concept of identifying and grouping objects according to color.

How to further teach these concepts in a classroom setting: To further teach these concepts, I will provide various opportunities for children to count using games, materials, objects, and activities. I will also encourage children to identify and group items based on characteristics by providing various colored, shaped, and sized toys (colored blocks, small animal figurines, colored buttons and ribbons). Observe the children in the classroom to see if they count, identify, and group objects during informal activities and play time. If you observe this, ask questions as to why they have grouped certain objects, or inquire how many. Results/Reflection: Before the activity: I predict the child will enjoy doing this activity and will successfully count, identify, and group the objects included. I decided to create an activity that focused on counting, along with other mathematical concepts because I have observed inconsistency with this childs counting skills. Sometimes he would be able to count to ten perfectly and other times he would only be able to count to five. Through observation, I also found that this child is absorbed with anything having to do with cars: toy cars, car drawings, car movies, etc., which is why I included toy cars in this activity. I did this activity while babysitting the child in his home and followed it exactly as it is listed above. Although the child was successful in counting the number of toy cars when placed in a straight line and divided into groups, he had trouble identifying the number of cars when scattered around the table. He would begin counting correctly and then would repeat numbers and/or count one toy car multiple times. After noticing that he was having difficulty counting the toy cars when they were dispersed, I decided to revisit it after completing the whole activity. When redoing this part of the activity, the child displayed great improvement because he was able to count the scattered cars in order. To make sure this was not an accident, I scrambled the cars again around the table and asked him once more to count how many. He was successfully counted the toy cars again. I observed that the child had an easier time counting in his home environment then in the day care environment, presumably because there were fewer distractions. I believe this activity was extremely effective in supporting the childs cognitive development. This allowed him to practice the mathematical concepts of grouping, counting, and identifying. It highlighted the childs ability to rote count up to 10, as well as grouping objects based on color. This activity can also support many other developmental domains, such as physical, social, and emotional. The child was able to pick up, move, and point to objects, which supports their development of fine motor skills. The child also constantly interacted with me while trying to count and find the objects required. I guided and supported the child through this activity, which encourages healthy emotional development. In the future, I would include greater numbers of cars with the same color. For example, instead of having only one green car and one blue car, I would have 3 of each to make it more challenging to count the number of toy cars within each color group. I would also increase the number of toy cars used in Part 2 to 16 instead of 10, so the child could have more opportunities to explore grouping and sorting skills.

PART 1

PART 2