We've been working on Ethan's maths skills while we play with In The Garden Bug Counters from Learning Resources.  They are a set of There are so many different ways to use such a simple resource, and we are having lots of fun finding as many ways to play with them that we can!  

We started by taking some out to look at them and identify what type of bug they were (there are snails, caterpillars, bees, spiders, dragonflies and grasshoppers) and then we used our circular sorting tray to put all the bugs of the same type together.  Ethan got the hang of it really quickly, and had fun playing with the bugs as he sorted them. He had the bees buzzing into the tray, the grasshoppers jumping and the snails slithering.


Another way to sort the bugs is by colour.  There are several of each type of bug in each colour (green, blue, red, yellow, purple and orange).  Ethan already had the hang of sorting from our first activity, so he was literally grabbing handfuls of bugs of the same colour and putting them into the tray, he was loving it!


We were also able to work on Ethan's fine motor control by using some jumbo tweezers to pick up the bugs and put them into the tray.  This also slowed Ethan down a bit, as you can see it's a new skill for him and he had to really concentrate, and use two hands to pick up the bugs.  We took this opportunity to slowly count the bugs as they went into the tray.  Ethan is a bit young yet to make patterns, but that will be the next set of activities that we will do with the bugs when he's ready.

* This is a review post, Learning Resources sent us the counters, sorting tray and tweezers to play with and write an honest review about. *