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You are here: Home / Learning Activities / Exploring Numbers with Play Dough

Exploring Numbers with Play Dough

 

The other day, E and I made a fresh new badge of homemade play dough. Before we were able to use it, E’s baby brother N needed us, though, and bed time came without having had a chance to play with our play dough. As a surprise, I set up a divided tray with cookie cutters, number stamps, counters and a die as an invitation to explore numbers with play dough the next day after preschool.

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

(E was 3.75 years old.)

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To explore numbers with play dough, you’ll need:

  • Play dough {we made ours following our favorite recipe from Learn with Play at Home but store bought play dough works just as well}.
  • Number cookie cutters.
  • Number stamps {they’re meant to be cutters according to Hasbro but I thought they were stamps when I saw them, and we found them pretty difficult to cut with, much easier to stamp…}; if you’re looking to buy them, there’s also this set that may be a nice alternative, even though I haven’t seen it in person: it includes letters and is actually cheaper.
  • Magnetic numbers.
  • Counters – we had blue glass gems and colorful party picks.
  • Die.
  • Divided tray.

 

 

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

E started out decorating the play dough right where it was in the middle of the tray.

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

She was losing interest pretty quickly, so I encouraged her to take out the play dough and try the little “game” I’d thought of in case she didn’t really know what to do with the materials: Roll the die and decorate the play dough with the number you rolled. So use the magnetic number 6, number 6 stamp, number 6 cookie cutter, six glass gems and six party picks.

She did it once {there are six gems, she pushed the sixth one way into the play dough 😉 }

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

then decided to proceed without the die and pick a number herself. She went with number 2.

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

This seemed to remind her how much she likes cookie cutters, and she started cutting 2s.

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

Lots of 2s 🙂 And apparently, they spelled my name 😉

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

Next, she moved on to number 1

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

and as you may imagine, the 1s spelled Papa’s name 🙂

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

After the cookie cutters, she moved on to the number stamps. They were new to us, and I found them pretty interesting. Now E was getting interested as well.

She tried to use them for cutting but wasn’t really happy with the results

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

{As it turns out, Hasbro does call them cutters… You’d have to roll out the play dough pretty thin to make good cut outs. If you want to cut, it’s way easier with cookie cutters.}

It didn’t take her long to figure out how much pressure to use to just make indentations in the play dough, and she liked it a lot better that way.

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

E ended up exploring her numbers for about 45 minutes and had a lot of fun.

Then it was time for clean up. She insisted on tossing the stamps back into the tray – she had surprisingly good aim 😉

 

Combine basic math concepts with sensory play while exploring numbers with play dough.

 

Does your toddler or preschooler enjoy learning her numbers? What’s her favorite way of learning? Tell me about it in the comments!

 

 

Do your kids love learning activities?

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ABCs & 123s is THE book for you if you're looking for learning activities for kids from preschoolers to kindergarteners and beyond! 40+ hands-on play based FUN learning activities cover everything from letter recognition to double digit addition, from writing numbers to understanding base-ten. Your kids will have so much fun learning and reviewing all kinds of math and literacy concepts!

 

 

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Learning Activities// Sensory Activities4 Comments

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Comments

  1. Susen @ Dabbling Momma says

    August 27, 2014 at 7:39 pm

    It’s interesting what grabs a child’s attention and what doesn’t! It’s great that you found something to keep your daughter playing for 45 mins!!

    Reply
    • Tina {Simple Fun for Kids} says

      August 28, 2014 at 10:22 am

      Yes, you definitely can’t always tell ahead of time – but that makes it even more fun 😉 Thanks for stopping by!

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. 20+ Hands-On Learning Ideas Using Playdough says:
    April 6, 2017 at 5:52 pm

    […] Explore numbers using playdough, and number stamps, cookie cutters, magnetic numbers and more. A great hands on way to learn numbers using many different types of tools. […]

    Reply
  2. 20 Learning Numbers and Counting Activities says:
    March 22, 2019 at 1:07 am

    […] Exploring Numbers with Play Dough | Simple Fun for Kids […]

    Reply

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Hi and welcome to Simple Fun for Kids! I'm Tina, mom of a kindergartener and a toddler, wife, German in Texas, blogger at all hours of the night. Click here to find out more about me...

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