I’d Like to Introduce Myself

Hello everyone,

I’m Heather Holbrook and I’m really excited to be the new stamping editor here at CraftGossip! I’ll be bringing you info on all the latest and greatest in absolutely everything to do with stamping.

Here’s a little info about myself: I’ve been stamping for over 12 years, I went to my first stamping class with my mom and some friends just for fun not really knowing what to expect and I instantly fell in love. I’d always enjoyed doing different crafts but when I found stamping I thought “this is it, this is for me!” and I’ve been stamping ever since. I loved it so much that a couple of years after that first class I opened my own stamp store, Stamps Galore, in Lexington KY and ran it for three years. My love of stamping expanded into a love of all art that uses paper so I also enjoy scrapbooking , collage, altered art and making soldered jewelry with paper as well. I’ve taught all different types of stamping and paper arts classes over the last 10 years and really love staying on top of the latest products, techniques and trends so if you’ve got a question about stamping please don’t hesitate to ask.

I’m looking forward to sharing my passion of stamping with you!

Heather

Pairing learning with activities and games is the best way to get kids to learn, and there are a lot of ways to make math centers to help kids learn numbers, number order, one to one correspondence and more.

Each of those skills could probably be its own post, but let’s delve a little deeper into some ideas for math centers for early learners.

Ten frames are a classic for learning to count and understanding numbers. It’s just a grid of five columns and two rows to start with, so you can draw one by hand or on your computer, or make one out of tape on the floor like this version from Busy Toddler. It includes an activity using a deck of cards and little toys to count out the number you see.

Similarly, this dot sticker math activity from Happy Toddler Playtime uses Uno cards and has kids peel and stick the number they see on the card. You can do this with stickers of any kind, dot markers or whatever manipulatives you have on hand, from pom poms to little erasers.

Peeling stickers is a great fine motor activity addition to the math center, and another take on that is this one from Laughing Kids Learn, where she wrote numbers in muffin liners. Kids can use tongs or tweezers to pick up pompoms to place the correct number in each liner. You could also use plastic cups for this.

And speaking of cups, any cup with a rim (these are actually Styrofoam, not plastic) can be used to make an easy number tower activity for your math center. This one is from The Activity Mom and is super simple to set up. You could actually use the same cups for different activities such as stacking the cups in order, doing odd and even numbers or placing items in the cups.

While kids are learning the numbers in order they can play with this missing number math activity from Planning Playtime. It uses supplies you probably already have — craft sticks and clothespins — and is another great fine motor skill builder at the same time it teaches math skills.

These last few are paid but they’re cute so I couldn’t help sharing. Use unit cubes to build a city with building of differing heights with this printable from Preschool Activities. Or count with plastic links with this one from The Kinderhearted Classroom. I also love the flip, make and build printable from Blocks and Beads that helps teach counting up to 10.

Have you read?