I saw this idea over at Happily Ever mom on Instagram last week and mentally filed it away to use with Colston (3) to work on recognizing his OWN name. We worked so long with Brixton on how to spell his name that now Colston also recites “B-R-I-X-T-O-N. COLSTON!!!” Whoops 🤭
So that’s a thing at my house right now 🤦‍♀️ We’re working on it, y’all.

Anyway, that is coming at a later date. I just haven’t had a chance to make it up for him yet. I did make an addition version of it though! Brixton had a dentist appointment last week, and knew this would be the perfect waiting room activity. What I forgot was that the pediatric dentist we go to, has a waiting room LOADED with things for kiddos to play with. And they always call you back on time, so there isn’t a lot of waiting around going on. (Seriously guys, if you’re in north Houston, check out Enchanted Forest Pediatric Dentistry in The Woodlands, Dr. Maria and her staff are sososo great!)

It all worked out in the end, though, because we ended up in that awkward time space after of not-enough-time-to-go-anywhere and entirely-too-early-to-pick-up-Colston. Everett also decided it was the appropriate time to fall asleep, so we definitely weren’t getting out of the car. Instead, I pulled it out and Brixton and I worked on it hanging out in the school parking lot instead!

We introduced addition a couple weeks ago with jelly beans and Brixton has been asking for more ever since. I’m thrilled he’s loving it, and hope that keeping it low pressure will continue to encourage his love of learning. I pulled a box from our recycling bin and cut it apart. I wrote out some simple addition problems and then wrote the answers on some dot-stickers in random order. When it was introduced initially, we had jelly beans to use as manipulatives, so I kept all of these equalling under 9, so we could use fingers this time.

We started out by using my fingers. Brixton would read out the equation and I would hope up my hands so he could use them to count. About a third of the way through I started only holding up half of the equation and he had to hold up the rest. Then I stopped altogether and he had to do it all.

I could see his brain working so hard at figuring these out, but the excitement each time he got the answer was so much fun too! And it proudly brought it inside to show Colston’s teachers and couldn’t wait to show dad when he got home from work. He even took it to school with him the next day to show his teachers! He’s been carrying it around with him every day since, so I think it’s safe to say he’s pretty proud of himself. And so am I 😍

How do you work on addition with your preschooler? We’d love to see your new ideas or if you try out dot sticker addition! Tag us on Instagram @thebplusmama and give us a follow to see what we’re up to on a day-to-day basis!