3 Simple Ways to Teach Counting for Kids + Free Printables

Teaching counting for kids can be fun and easy because you hardly need anything to teach this important math skill.

Research shows that kids who learn to count early, develop a fondness for numbers.

Moreover, their understanding of numbers as quantities serves as a foundation on which all other complex math skills such as addition and subtraction can be built easily.

In this post, I’m going to share with you 3 simple ways to teach counting for kids as well as some FREE counting printables for you to use:

Everyday Conversations and Interactions
Number Rhymes
Counting Books
BONUS: Hands-on Counting Activities + FREE Printables

>>SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST TO DOWNLOAD YOUR FREE COUNTING ACTIVITY PRINTABLES<<<

1. Everyday Conversations and Interactions

Research shows that children learn best through enjoyable interactions with their primary caregivers.

So including numbers and counting in your daily conversations make it fun and natural for your child to learn to count.

So what can you do?

Simple!

Just point to anything and everything in your child’s environment and count them and encourage your child to do the same.

And while counting, make sure your child points to or touches the objects as this will help your child understand that counting is nothing but ‘quantifying’—a very important knowledge to have!

Here are some examples:

“How many toes does my baby have? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 – 10 toes.”

“Let’s see how many crackers you have on your plate 1 2 3 – 3 crackers.”

“That is a cool car! Let’s count how many wheels the car has! 1 2 3 4 – 4 wheels.”

Apart from pointing and touching, you can also model holding up the correct number of fingers to represent the quantity.

“How old are you? You are 1, 2 – 2 years old.”

Don’t just limit yourself to the things at home instead count the number of steps as you climb up and down the stairs, count the number of cars in the parking lot, count the number of birds in the power line.

The idea is to simply count, count, and count!

Having said that, don’t overdo it to a point where you literally wear out your child’s interest. Just remember to keep these interactions fun and carefree.

2. Number Rhymes

Another classic way to introduce counting to kids is to sing number rhymes.

Instead of just singing, if you can include toys or other manipulatives, it can make things fun and interesting for your child.

When our son was little, he had 5 rubber bath duckies and his favorite thing to do was to line them up and sing the 5 little ducks song.

Here is a list of popular number rhymes to introduce counting for kids:

3. Counting Books

Counting books are a great way to teach counting while developing literacy skills.

The combination of pictures, stories, and numbers will certainly allure your little one to come back to these books over and over again.

Here is a list of 20 Must-Read Counting books that every child should read.

Books on Counting to 20:

Books on Counting Backward:

Books on Counting Big Numbers:

You can check out my post on 20 Must-Read Counting Books for Kids to learn more about each of these books.

BONUS: Hands-on Counting Activities

Hands-on activities make learning interesting!

Here are some FREE Counting printables for you to teach counting and one-to-one correspondence in a more fun hands-on way.

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I hope you found this blog post 3 Simple Ways to Teach Counting for Kids + Free Printables and the resources shared in this post helpful.

If you did, let us know in the comments below.

Would love to hear from you!

For more FREE Printables for kids, check out our Freebie’s Page!