Math Learning Steps

The world of shapes

There are many possibilities that open up as your child’s understanding of properties grows. For example, they can now understand geometric shapes and talk about them!

Counting sides

Distinguishing between a triangle, square, rectangle, hexagon, and octagon will involve the idea of “sides” and being able to count those sides. Your child’s growing understanding of quantities will make this counting possible. Also, as your child begins to automatically identify these shapes, that will help them to deepen their understand of the quantities for 3, 4, 6, and 8.

Basic shapes

For now, stay with basic shapes and build confidence and fluency with those shapes. Of course, you can always mix in any additional shapes, such as stars, that your child happens to enjoy.

Here is a list of words for flat shapes:

• Circle
• Triangle
• Rectangle (looks like a piece of paper)
• Square (rectangle with equal sides)
• Hexagon (6 sides)
• Octagon (8 sides – stop sign)

This is a list of words for 3-dimensional shapes:

• Ball (Sphere)
• Cylinder (Round tube)
• Box (Cube)

Hands on

Use and explain these shape names as your child plays with objects that have these shapes. Give them lots of opportunities to see how these fit together or build on top of each other. Help your child identify these shapes as you see the shapes out in the world.