M&M Math for Little Ones

Math has never been one of my strongest subjects and I know that was one of my biggest worries when I became a teacher, let alone began homeschooling Lo. The one thing though that my "deficiency" taught me was to think outside the box when it came to the actual tools needed to teach my students and then little ones. 
Since this year we started from scratch when it came to adding and subtracting I knew I need to use something that would engage my little man. So what better item than to give him instant gratification with each learning experience. Not just by having the feeling of success by getting the problems right but a tasty treat to top the experience off.  I began using M&M to teach counting. Making them such versatile items due to their color & size.

 

After learning how to count we moved on to Adding & subtracting them. Simply using these manipulatives keeps him focused because at the end if he does what hes supposed to and follows directions he gets this delicious little candy.

 

The sky's the limit when it comes to teaching using M&M's (or any candy manipulative) you can :

• group them by colors teaching about likeness
• teach your little one about graphing by charting them and graphing how many you have
• teaching about ones,tens and hundreds (use different colors for each grouping) 
• measuring items using M&M's  (There's 13 M&M's in 6inches) 
• Learning colors through M&M's
• and so much more!....

 You can of course use any candy or item (I've even used legos to teach Math) when teaching your little one these basic concepts. The point is to always think outside the box. Teaching/learning don't have to be exclusive to worksheets and books. Learning happens with items all around us. If you start teaching your little one to use everyday items when learning you will notice they will start using other items to bring the learning experience into their everyday life.