Sorry, this page is no longer available
We may earn an affiliate commission when you visit our partners.
Course image
Mandy Lam

Helping children develop their early childhood numeracy skills can have a profound impact on their future math skills during school years. That is because these skills are part of the foundation of math learning including logical reasoning, problem solving, and observing patterns. This course aims to offer you strategies to support your child’s early childhood numeracy development as your child’s caregiver or first teacher.

Read more

Helping children develop their early childhood numeracy skills can have a profound impact on their future math skills during school years. That is because these skills are part of the foundation of math learning including logical reasoning, problem solving, and observing patterns. This course aims to offer you strategies to support your child’s early childhood numeracy development as your child’s caregiver or first teacher.

There are many benefits to using these strategies. The first and foremost benefit is that you can make learning not feel like learning at all for both you and your child. These strategies will help you integrate numeracy learning seamlessly into your everyday interactions, activities, and routines, and make numeracy learning more fun and enjoyable for both you and your child.

By completing this course, you will learn to facilitate play-based learning at home or in an early childhood education environment. You will gain skills in observing children's interest and curiosities, which would help you guide children's learning. 

Whether your role is a parent, caregiver, or early childhood educator, the strategies and theories you learn will allow your child could benefit from building a strong foundation in numeracy skills and cultivating their confidence to succeed in math during their future school years.

Contents and Overview

This course contains 16 lectures and 60 minutes of content. It is designed for anyone who is a caregiver or educator of children in their early childhood years, which is from birth to the age of 8.

The following are the key topics in this course:

1) Stages of Early Numeracy Development

2) Make Numeracy Part of Everyday Life

3) Communication Techniques

4) Teaching and Learning Numeracy for Children

5) Numeracy Development through Storytelling

6) Do-It-Yourself Math Toys and Activities

In this course, you will first learn about the stages of early numeracy development, which will provide you with an overview of a child’s developmental abilities and milestones. This will give you the foundation to understand the stages your child is going through and to choose the appropriate strategies that could support and enhance your child’s numeracy skill development. This will help you apply both age-appropriate and developmental stage-appropriate strategies to optimize children's learning. You will also learn about innate numeracy skills that children are born with. By understanding how children think and their cognitive ability in understanding numbers and quantities will help you see learning through the lens of children and become a better teacher.

Next, you will learn concrete strategies to infuse numeracy learning into your everyday life. These strategies will offer you ways to introduce, reinforce, and advance your child’s numeracy skills depending on the stage of development they are at. You will learn about various techniques and principles of learning to create learning contexts and play-based activities for your child. You will understand that for children, any environment or setting can become an opportunity for learning. You will also gain skills in navigating spontaneous learning moments that arise to facilitate impactful learning.

After that, you will learn ways to support your child’s numeracy development during their early school years. This course will show you strategies that will support your child’s learning of other numeracy-related skill sets in school, such as patterning, geometry, and measurements. Very often, parents and teachers focus heavily on numbers and operations when it comes to mathematics learning. The skill sets in patterning, geometry, and measurements are equally important and valuable. You will learn ways to build a strong foundation in mathematics for children.

And finally, you will learn to facilitate numeracy development through storytelling. Just as children have an innate ability to understand numbers and quantities, they also have an innate ability to understand language. They have an innate sense of wonder and curiosity that could be brought out through reading and listening to stories. Storybooks with a math focus are excellent resources. I will show you examples of Math Storybooks and how you can integrate them into early childhood numeracy development. Then I will discuss the research and theories behind the effectiveness of facilitating numeracy development through storytelling.

This course will end with examples of how you can create math toys and activities with children to optimize the learning experience for them. These examples and ideas will show you how to create and use concrete learning tools, which are extremely important for you to model mathematical ideas and make thinking visible as a facilitator of learning. For children, math toys are also tools that help them see patterns and relationships, make connections between the concrete and the abstract, remember how they solved a problem, test and confirm their logical reasoning, and communicate their ideas and reasoning to others.   

Learning Outcomes

1) Create learning contexts that allow children to use their innate numeracy skills

2) Facilitate children's learning of numbers and quantities through play and other daily activities

3) Use principles of Universal Design for Learning to identify children’s interests, curiosities, and inquiries in numeracy skills development

4) Use effective communication techniques to facilitate numeracy learning

Enroll now

What's inside

Learning objectives

  • Create learning contexts that allow children to use their innate numeracy skills
  • Facilitate children's learning of numbers and quantities through play and other daily activities
  • Use principles of universal design for learning to identify children's interests, curiosities, and inquiries in numeracy skills development
  • Use effective communication techniques to facilitate numeracy learning

Syllabus

Introduction

This lecture will provide you with a more detailed description of the course. You will learn about the importance of guiding children’s early numeracy development. This lecture will also provide you with the learning outcomes of the course.

Read more

You will learn about the stages of development in understanding quantities and numbers from a child’s birth to preschool years, and to their early years in formal schooling. Understanding the stages of early numeracy development will give you the foundation to create appropriate learning contexts for children to develop their numeracy skills.

In this lecture, you will learn about the innate skill known as, subitizing. It is a skill that allows us to recognize quantities. You will learn the details involved in the cognitive process when children are first learning to count. Understanding these fundamental skills will help you facilitate numeracy learning for children.

This lecture will provide you with strategies to introduce, reinforce, and advance numeracy learning through many common daily routines or activities in a child’s life. Depending on the age and stage of development of the child, you can adopt or refine strategies that best fit a child’s needs.

In this lecture, you will learn about the two main types of social interactions and the different types of play. You will learn about strategies that facilitate different types of play and integrate numeracy learning into structured and non-structured play.

You will learn one of the three key communication techniques that are discussed in this course. Through this lecture, you will learn about the Questioning technique and examples of how you can use this technique to prompt a child for further numeracy learning and check a child’s understanding.

In this lecture, you will learn strategies to communicate with children so that quantities and numbers would become less abstract in their learning process. Using the technique, Make Thinking Visible, you will be able to engage children in numeracy learning by helping them experience quantities and numbers in multiple ways.

This lecture will provide you with various ways to support children’s learning process by using the technique of Positive Reinforcement. You will learn from concrete examples of how you should respond to children in different scenarios.

In this lecture, you will learn the three key principles of Universal Design for Learning. Using these principles of a guide, you will learn from concrete examples that allow children to learn numbers through multiple ways and to express themselves through multiple ways.

You will learn about the two kinds of thinking process that are involved when solving a problem. This lecture will focus on the thinking process that drives creativity and provide you with strategies to allow your child to be creative during numeracy learning.

Early childhood numeracy skills is the foundation for other skill sets that are involved in mathematics learning. In this lecture, you will learn about the other three areas that are important skill sets in mathematics learning during the years of formal schooling. You will also learn strategies to help your child develop these numeracy-related skills.

In this lecture, you will learn to facilitate numeracy development through storytelling. Catalyzing children's innate sense of wonder and curiosity when they are immersed into stories, stories become impactful contexts for numeracy development. Storybooks that have a math focus are excellent resources to build a foundation for future math skills. I will show you examples of Math Storybooks and how you can integrate them into early childhood numeracy development. Then I will discuss the research and theories behind the effectiveness of facilitating numeracy development through storytelling.

In this lecture, you will learn to create your own math toys made with simple crafts and household materials. You will learn to create your own math toys that helps children learn about adding to 10.

In this lecture, you will learn to create your own math toys made with simple crafts and household materials. You will learn to create your own math toys that helps children learn geometry.

In this lecture, you will learn to create your own math toys made with simple crafts and household materials. You will learn to create your own math toys that helps children learn and practice the fundamental operations.

In this lecture, you will learn to create your own math toys made with simple crafts and household materials. You will learn to create your own math toys that helps children learn about patterning and measurements.

Traffic lights

Read about what's good
what should give you pause
and possible dealbreakers
Explores stages of early numeracy development, which provides a foundation for understanding a child's abilities and choosing appropriate strategies to support their numeracy skill development
Teaches concrete strategies to infuse numeracy learning into everyday life, offering ways to introduce, reinforce, and advance a child's numeracy skills depending on their developmental stage
Discusses techniques like 'Make Thinking Visible' to engage children in numeracy learning by helping them experience quantities and numbers in multiple ways
Presents principles of Universal Design for Learning, offering concrete examples that allow children to learn and express themselves through multiple ways during numeracy activities
Includes creating math toys and activities with children to optimize learning, modeling mathematical ideas, and making thinking visible as a facilitator of learning
Examines the importance of patterning, geometry, and measurements alongside numbers and operations, providing ways to build a strong foundation in mathematics for children

Save this course

Create your own learning path. Save this course to your list so you can find it easily later.
Save

Reviews summary

Practical numeracy strategies for early years

According to learners, this course provides a solid foundation and practical strategies for fostering early childhood numeracy skills. Students highlight the course's ability to integrate math development into everyday activities and play, making learning fun and engaging for children. The inclusion of helpful examples, such as using storytelling and DIY math toys, is frequently praised. Learners appreciate the clear explanations of developmental stages and communication techniques. It is considered highly relevant and applicable for both parents and early childhood educators seeking actionable ways to support young children's math understanding.
Discusses helpful communication methods.
"The communication techniques discussed, like 'Make Thinking Visible', are valuable for guiding children."
"Learning how to ask questions effectively to prompt numeracy thinking was a key takeaway."
"Positive reinforcement strategies were well explained and easy to apply."
Covers key stages of numeracy development.
"Understanding the stages of early numeracy development helped me tailor activities to my child's age."
"The module on developmental stages provided a great framework for the rest of the course content."
"It was useful to learn about what numeracy skills are innate and how they develop."
Applicable to various caregiver roles.
"As a parent, I found this course incredibly relevant and easy to follow."
"This course is beneficial for anyone working with young children, whether you're a teacher or a parent."
"The content is practical for both home and classroom settings."
Provides useful examples and activities.
"The examples of DIY math toys and using storytelling were particularly helpful and creative."
"Loved the concrete examples provided! Seeing how to implement the strategies made a big difference."
"The section on math storybooks gave me great resources to start with."
"Creating the math toys was a fun activity idea that my child also enjoyed."
Offers actionable, everyday strategies.
"I found the strategies for integrating numeracy into everyday life incredibly useful. It makes learning feel natural."
"This course gives me practical tips I can use right away with my child during daily routines."
"Excellent strategies provided that I can apply immediately in my classroom. Very hands-on and doable."
"The course offered many actionable ideas on how to encourage numeracy development through simple interactions."

Activities

Be better prepared before your course. Deepen your understanding during and after it. Supplement your coursework and achieve mastery of the topics covered in Early Childhood Education - Numeracy and Math Development with these activities:
Review Stages of Early Numeracy Development
Reviewing the stages of early numeracy development will provide a solid foundation for understanding the course material and applying appropriate strategies.
Show steps
  • Review notes on early numeracy stages.
  • Identify key milestones for each stage.
  • Reflect on personal experiences with children and their numeracy development.
Create a Resource List of Math Toys and Activities
Compiling a resource list provides a readily available collection of tools and ideas for supporting early numeracy development.
Show steps
  • Research and gather information on various math toys and activities suitable for young children.
  • Categorize the resources by numeracy concept (e.g., counting, shapes, patterns).
  • Write a brief description of each resource, including its purpose and how to use it.
  • Organize the resource list in a user-friendly format (e.g., spreadsheet, document).
Read 'The Number Sense: How the Mind Creates Mathematics'
Reading this book will provide a deeper understanding of the cognitive processes involved in early numeracy development.
View The Number Sense on Amazon
Show steps
  • Read the book, focusing on chapters related to early childhood development.
  • Take notes on key concepts and research findings.
  • Reflect on how the book's insights can be applied to teaching and caregiving practices.
Four other activities
Expand to see all activities and additional details
Show all seven activities
Practice Communication Techniques with a Child
Practicing communication techniques with a child will help internalize the strategies taught in the course and improve real-world application.
Show steps
  • Choose a communication technique (e.g., questioning, making thinking visible, positive reinforcement).
  • Engage a child in a numeracy-related activity (e.g., counting objects, sorting shapes).
  • Apply the chosen communication technique during the activity.
  • Reflect on the effectiveness of the technique and identify areas for improvement.
Design a DIY Math Toy
Designing a DIY math toy reinforces the principles of play-based learning and allows for creative application of numeracy concepts.
Show steps
  • Choose a numeracy concept to focus on (e.g., counting, shapes, patterns).
  • Gather household materials for creating the toy.
  • Design and build the toy, ensuring it is safe and engaging for young children.
  • Write instructions on how to use the toy to teach the chosen numeracy concept.
Explore 'Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi'
Exploring math-focused storybooks provides examples of how to integrate storytelling into early childhood numeracy development.
Show steps
  • Read the book and identify the mathematical concepts it introduces.
  • Brainstorm ways to use the book to create a problem-solving activity for children.
  • Adapt the story to create a new numeracy-focused narrative.
Develop a Numeracy-Focused Lesson Plan
Developing a lesson plan allows for the synthesis of course concepts and the creation of a structured learning experience for children.
Show steps
  • Choose a specific numeracy skill to teach (e.g., number recognition, counting, simple addition).
  • Define learning objectives and assessment methods.
  • Design activities that incorporate play-based learning and communication techniques.
  • Create materials and resources needed for the lesson.
  • Pilot the lesson plan with a small group of children and gather feedback.

Career center

Learners who complete Early Childhood Education - Numeracy and Math Development will develop knowledge and skills that may be useful to these careers:
Preschool Teacher
A preschool teacher fosters early childhood development, and this course provides strategies to integrate numeracy learning into daily activities. Preschool teachers create engaging lesson plans that include math concepts. This course helps preschool teachers understand stages of early numeracy development, use communication techniques, and create math activities. With the course's emphasis on play-based learning and understanding children's interests, a preschool teacher can make math fun. This course helps preschool teachers use storytelling, make math toys, and create activities for optimizing learning.
Kindergarten Teacher
A kindergarten teacher introduces foundational academic skills. This course will be useful as it offers strategies to effortlessly integrate numeracy learning into everyday interactions. Kindergarten teachers can enhance their teaching by implementing techniques from this course into their lesson plans. The course's focus on play-based learning and observing children's interests aligns well with kindergarten curriculum goals. A kindergarten teacher can use the course to help build a strong foundation in mathematics. This course teaches the stages of early numeracy development, communication techniques, and creating math toys.
Early Childhood Special Educator
An early childhood special educator supports children with diverse learning needs, and this course provides inclusive strategies for numeracy development. Early childhood special educators require diverse techniques to support numeracy skills. This course focuses on using learning principles to identify children’s interests in numeracy, to create appropriate learning contexts. An early childhood special educator can leverage the course's content on storytelling and math-related activities to develop tailored interventions.
Curriculum Developer
A curriculum developer designs engaging and effective learning materials. This course offers insights into incorporating numeracy. Curriculum developers can enhance their content to align with early childhood education standards by integrating strategies from this course. The course’s learning outcomes, syllabus, and focus on creating learning contexts using children's innate numeracy skills are highly relevant. By understanding the effectiveness of storytelling and activities, a curriculum developer can create resources.
Educational Consultant
Educational consultants provide expert advice on teaching practices. This course, with its strategies for supporting early numeracy development, is directly applicable. Educational consultants can use the course learnings to advise teachers and caregivers on integrating numeracy into daily routines. The course's emphasis on learning, communication techniques, and practical activities equips an educational consultant with tools to improve numeracy education. Furthermore, the strategies and theories you learn will allow a child could benefit from building a strong foundation.
Family Support Specialist
Family support specialists assist families with resources and strategies, and this course may be useful as it provides tools to promote early numeracy skills. Family support specialists can offer parents strategies to integrate numeracy learning into daily life using techniques from the course. With its focus on play-based learning, a family support specialist can help families make learning fun. A family support specialist will have knowledge to help families, regarding children's innate numeracy skills, which is taught by this course. This course focuses on strategies that support numeracy development.
Elementary School Teacher
An elementary school teacher instructs young children in literacy, numeracy, and other foundational skills. This course focuses on building early childhood numeracy skills, which is essential for success later. Elementary school teachers can use this course to learn various techniques and principles of learning to create learning contexts for their students. The course emphasis on communication techniques helps elementary school teachers to effectively deliver concepts and ideas in mathematics. This course can help elementary school teachers create a strong foundation in children.
Nanny
A nanny cares for children in a home setting and may find this course useful. Nannies can promote early numeracy skills with strategies to integrate numeracy learning into everyday activities. Nannies will learn ways to introduce, reinforce, and advance a child's numeracy skills. Nannies will also learn concrete examples of how you should respond to children in different scenarios. The course's strategies and theories allow a child to benefit from a strong foundation in numeracy skills. This course focuses on play-based learning and understanding children's interests.
Instructional Designer
An instructional designer creates educational materials, and this course helps increase their understanding of early numeracy development. Instructional designers can learn strategies to integrate numeracy learning into various interactive formats. The course's focus on learning through storytelling and activities helps instructional designers create engaging content. With its emphasis on play-based learning and observing children's interests, an instructional designer can make math feel like less of a chore. This course discusses communication techniques to ensure that instructional designers are creating effective learning experiences.
Children's Librarian
A children's librarian promotes literacy and learning. This course may be useful as it provides strategies to promote early numeracy development. Children's librarians can use the course to understand techniques for creating more effective storytelling activities. The course focuses on numeracy development through storytelling. Children's librarians will be able to create activities that incorporate numeracy skills. This course teaches innate numeracy skills and how to support numeracy development.
Camp Counselor
A camp counselor supervises children in recreational activities. This course could provide strategies to incorporate numeracy learning into camp programs. Camp counselors can use the course to learn about techniques for play-based learning and creating fun math-related activities. This course facilitates numeracy learning. With the course's discussion of innate numeracy skills, camp counselors can craft activities. Camp counselors will be equipped with tools to engage children of all ages by completing this informative course.
Museum Educator
A museum educator develops and delivers educational programs within a museum setting. This course could assist in effectively integrating numeracy concepts. Museum educators can implement strategies from the course to design engaging math-related exhibits. This course facilitates numeracy learning. Museum educators will be able to create activities that incorporate numeracy skills. This course teaches innate numeracy skills and helps museum educators to create learning contexts for children.
Content Creator
A content creator develops engaging educational materials, and this course may be useful as it enhances an understanding of early numeracy development. Content creators can learn strategies to integrate numeracy learning into various interactive formats. The course's focus on learning through storytelling helps content creators develop engaging content. The course emphasizes play-based learning and observing children's interests to make math an adventure for viewers. The course's syllabus and learning objectives may inform the direction of content to create.
Toy Designer
A toy designer creates playthings for children of all ages. Toy designers may find this course useful as it covers making math toys. This course focuses on Universal Design for Learning to identify children’s interests in numeracy skills development. The course provides examples of math storybooks and how you can integrate them into early childhood numeracy development. Toy designers will be able to create fun and interactive toys.
Textbook Author
A textbook author writes educational textbooks for students of all ages. This course discusses math toys and activities that may be useful to textbook authors. The course examines the stages of early numeracy development. Textbook authors will be able to understand the cognitive processes that are involved when learning to count. This course provides strategies to introduce and reinforce numeracy learning.

Reading list

We've selected two books that we think will supplement your learning. Use these to develop background knowledge, enrich your coursework, and gain a deeper understanding of the topics covered in Early Childhood Education - Numeracy and Math Development.
Explores the cognitive foundations of mathematical abilities. It provides insights into how children develop their understanding of numbers and mathematical concepts. Reading this book will provide a deeper understanding of the cognitive processes involved in early numeracy development, enriching the course content. It is valuable as additional reading to expand on the course's core concepts.
Is part of a series of math adventure stories that make learning fun. It introduces mathematical concepts in an engaging way. It great resource for integrating storytelling into numeracy development. This book is more valuable as additional reading to inspire ideas for teaching.

Share

Help others find this course page by sharing it with your friends and followers:

Similar courses

Similar courses are unavailable at this time. Please try again later.
Our mission

OpenCourser helps millions of learners each year. People visit us to learn workspace skills, ace their exams, and nurture their curiosity.

Our extensive catalog contains over 50,000 courses and twice as many books. Browse by search, by topic, or even by career interests. We'll match you to the right resources quickly.

Find this site helpful? Tell a friend about us.

Affiliate disclosure

We're supported by our community of learners. When you purchase or subscribe to courses and programs or purchase books, we may earn a commission from our partners.

Your purchases help us maintain our catalog and keep our servers humming without ads.

Thank you for supporting OpenCourser.

© 2016 - 2025 OpenCourser