If your child is starting school this September or if you teach Junior Infants then this post is for you!

The first aspect of maths that your child will explore in Junior Infants in called “Early Maths Activities”. Here are some of the objects:

The good news is I found an app that matches these objectives perfectly! It is available for use on both  iPads and iPhones.

So here’s the game: Maths, age 3-5

In this game your child is being asked to add similar objects to a clearly defined set on the basis of one attribute. This means adding all of the stars to the star set, all of the balls to the ball set and all of the flowers to the flower set. In the next round your child will be challenged to match objects to defined sets and to create sets to sort the others.

Both of these games more than fulfill the criteria of the Classifying strand above.

In this game your child is being asked to identify the “compliment of a set”. In other words your child needs to indicate the “odd one out”. This fulfills the criteria of the Classifying strand above.

The Comparing strand asks your child to “compare objects according to length, width, height, weight, quantity or size”. In this Maths 3-5 game your child needs to compare the clothing and objects to determine which one belongs to which boy. The object is then dragged and dropped to see if a correct match has been made. Some of these are tricky enough. You really need to concentrate!

In order to succeed at Matching your child need to be confident at matching identical objects and matching pairs of related objects. Maths 3-5 covers both of these!

The picture below shows a game that asks your child to  match related objects to each other such as the umbrella and the rain. Your child needs to do some deep thinking for these ones.

Matching similar objects is a game of Concentration. Children love to play ” Concentration” so this one is sure to be a big hit.

I cannot speak highly enough of these games from Maths 3-5. I am thrilled that I found them. They are a perfect match for our curriculum and fun to play too. The games that I have mentioned are available for free download but they cover much, much more. You can see a list of their games below. The games are very keenly priced. I would love to download and review all of them!

These are very worthwhile game to have your child playing this Summer or even next September. Having some familiarity with the curriculum can help children settle more easily into school. If your child can do all of these with ease then he/she will experience early success in school. This should foster self-esteem and a feeling that they can handle the challenges of Junior Infant life 😉

Have any of you used Maths 3-5 before? If you download the app please leave a comment or send me an email and let all of us know what you think.

Have fun,

Miss Mernagh 🙂