Halloween Candy Patterns

 

This was just a super quick and simple math brain teaser on a day where we got up way too early and had some time to kill before going to school: Halloween Candy Patterns!

We’d done some patterning before with Farm Animal Patterns and Patterning with Counting Blocks, but I realized that we had never talked about the terms for different patterns. So with a bowl of candy and a cookie sheet, we went to work!

 

(E was 4 years and 11 months old.)

This post contains affiliate links for your convenience.

 

Materials for Halloween Candy Patterns:

• Candy in at least two different shapes and/or colors for beginners, add more different options as appropriate.
• Cookie sheet, tray or similar to work on (optional).

 

Not surprisingly, E’s first question was if she could eat the candy. She’d never tried this kind before, but I kinda showed my hand and told her what it was while I was getting the candy out of the cabinet 😉 I told her she could have a few pieces after the activity.

 

 

We started by taking out one of each of the three types of candy to see what they were. E decided to extend this pattern until she ran out of candy.

 

 

I told her that a pattern like this is called an ABC pattern where the pumpkin is A, the candy corn is B, and the Indian corn is C. We went through each piece of candy and read the pattern she’d made.

She wanted to make a different pattern next and chose the pumpkins and the candy corn.

 

 

I explained that this is an ABB pattern, and once again we read her whole pattern together.

To finish up this quick activity, we made an AB pattern with the Indian corn and the pumpkins.

 

 

E added her own touch by making the final “pattern” – all the pumpkins in a row, all the candy corn in a row, and finally all the Indian corn 🙂

 

 

She counted them all and noticed that there were seven of each!

Finally, it was time for a taste test. E didn’t like ANY of them, to the point of spitting out the first one and only taking tiny nibbles of the other two 😉 Good thing they’re cute shapes perfect as manipulatives for Halloween math games! {E actually asked me the next day if we could do an activity with M&Ms, because they taste better 😉 }

 

Have you tried making patterns with your preschooler? What kinds of patterns did you make? Leave a comment below!

 

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Looking for more Halloween math? I’ve got some ideas for you!

Halloween Counting Clip Cards (10-20)

Halloween Counting Clip Cards (5-10)

Halloween Math Games from Kids Activities Blog

Halloween Candy Math from Chicken Babies

 

For more ways to work on patterns, check out these links:

Farm Animal Patterns

Patterning with Counting Blocks

Halloween Clothespins and Pattern Sticks from LalyMom

 

 

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