Counting money, the way children learn it
Children first learn to recognise each coin and note and its value, then to count a handful of the same coin, and then to add mixed coins by starting with the one worth the most and counting on. The coins on every problem are sorted from biggest to smallest value to support that habit.
Why there are no 5c coins
New Zealand stopped using 5c coins in 2006, and cash totals are rounded, so the sheets count with 10c, 20c, 50c, $1 and $2 coins, just like children see at the shop.
In the New Zealand Curriculum
- Year 2Ordering coins and notes from smallest to largest value, grouping them and adding them up.
- Year 3Writing amounts in dollars and cents without a decimal point, and working out change.
- Year 4Making amounts in dollars and cents, giving change from whole dollars, and rounding to the nearest dollar.
- Year 5Decimal notation for money, total costs, and change from the nearest $10.
Money first appears in Year 2 in the refreshed curriculum. Ordering the coins by value is the starting point, which is why sorting the 10c, 20c, 50c, $1 and $2 coins before counting works well.
Decimal notation such as $3.50 is a Year 5 goal, so younger children may say “three dollars fifty” long before they write it that way.
Summarised in our own words from the New Zealand Curriculum: Mathematics and Statistics, Years 0–8 (in effect from 2025), and the Ministry of Education’s year-by-year guide for parents and whānau.
