Fitting In
Activity, Stage 2 – Bigger and Smaller Numbers
Give your child a small number, say seven, of little objects and count them together. Pick a target number, say five.
Ask your child to take five objects out of the original group of seven objects, if it is possible. This helps your child learn the relative sizes of numbers and how much they are bigger or less than each other.
Variations
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At first, the target number should be less than or equal to the total number. Later on, giving numbers that are too big provides practice with the relative size of quantities, as well as providing practice checking that requests are reasonable.