Sorting can help your little learners make observations about how things are alike and how they are different — which are essential early literacy and math skills. As adults, we arrange objects, ideas, and events into convenient groups or categories daily. For example, in your kitchen your silverware is probably sorted in a drawer, and you keep certain foods in the refrigerator while others are on shelves in a cupboard.
Sorting also helps children develop critical executive function skills, which are skills that involve memory, attention and problem-solving. But executive function skills do not just develop on their own, young children must be provided with learning activities to help them develop these skills. Learning how to sort objects is a precursor math skill that comes before numerals and more advanced mathematical computations can be learned successfully. Visual representations can be used as supports to review concepts after concrete objects have been used.
This skill involves grouping objects together by their similarities and differences. These similarities and differences are often called attributes. Identifying and describing attributes is the ability to recognize common likenesses and differences between objects.
Some of the most common attributes for sorting are color, shape, size, how it feels, and how or in which context the item is used. Words like bigger than or smaller than are used in comparison activities. Words like biggest or smallest are used when ordering. Have you seen these sectioned chip and dip trays at the dollar store? They have so many uses in the early childhood classroom! You can easily use these trays to help teach children to sort objects by color into each section.
Your kids will enjoy sorting common items like pom-poms, buttons, or even paint chips into the sections. The possibilities for sorting with chip and dip trays are really endless. Add a pair of tweezers or tongs and invite your little learners to use them to pick up and transfer the manipulatives into the tray. You can use many different things for sorting in your classroom, these are just a few to get you started.
Another way to sort is by shape. Afterwards, you can invite your students to sort pictures of different shapes. We categorize and review the games listed here to help you find the games you are looking for. Related Pages More Educational Games. We have sorting games for objects and sorting games for shapes.
These games are suitable for pre-school and kindergarten. Try the free Mathway calculator and problem solver below to practice various math topics. Try the given examples, or type in your own problem and check your answer with the step-by-step explanations.
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