Counting is more than saying numbers
Children can often recite numbers long before they can count objects. Counting a scattered group asks them to match one number to one picture, keep track of what they have counted, and know that the last number says how many. These sheets practise all three.
How to use them
Start with counts to 5 and circling the number, then counts to 10, then writing. Counts to 20 suit New Entrants and Year 1, when children start to count larger groups.
In the New Zealand Curriculum
- Te WhārikiThe Mana reo | Communication strand includes children coming to recognise maths symbols and use them with enjoyment, meaning and purpose.
- First 6 monthsCounting forwards and backwards within 10 and then 20, seeing groups of up to 5 without counting, and reading and writing numerals 0 to 20.
- Year 1Reading, writing and comparing numbers to at least 100, and splitting a group of 20 objects in different ways.
New entrants spend their first months moving from counting one by one to recognising small groups at a glance. Scattered pictures keep counting honest. Once a child counts reliably, ask them to say how many are in a box of 3 or 4 before counting, then check.
In early learning services, Te Whāriki puts play first, so for preschoolers keep sheets short and pair them with real objects: shells, pine cones or counters. The write option ties in with the English curriculum, which teaches new entrants to form numbers correctly.
Summarised in our own words from Te Whāriki (2017), the early childhood curriculum, and the New Zealand Curriculum: Mathematics and Statistics, Years 0–8 (in effect from 2025).
