Math on the Playground: Part #2

Another gorgeous day meant we headed to the playground for some fresh air outside, wear-off-energy time, and more math on the playground fun. Thank you, Sun!

math on the playgroundYesterday, we had some fun with numbers at the small tot-lot at the end of our street. Today, the kids noticed some shapes. One of the platforms for climbing is a triangle shape. There is really only enough room for one person to stand in the wide part of the triangle. Bet you won’t need any clues as to how we discovered this shape. The second kidlet proclaimed she didn’t have enough room for her feet. Sometimes, learning could happen more peacefully, right? But, we then started to look for other shapes.

The climbing net had lots of squares. The climber was a rectangle with wiggly shapes. Part of a gate had diamonds on it. That became the castle area because diamonds are jewels. For more treasure, the kids looked for special rocks and pieces of wood. Circles were not obvious, but a bench looked like a moon which is part of a circle. With a little bit of shape-detective dust, the kids found a circle steering wheel on both teeter-totters and the duckie had circle springs underneath.

math on the playgroundA big board was sort of a rectangle shape, with part of a circle. When we looked at it closer—one of those things seen dozens of times but didn’t capture attention—we found to our amazement that it had lines and numbers for measuring. Kids could not only check their height, but also see how high they could reach and jump. Because the wood chips on the ground could be thicker at different times, this is only approximate but the kids turned into jumping beans and wanted someone to measure for them each time.

This math on the playground was not planned. It was not on the agenda for the day. It just happened. Experiences like this add up to such meaningful learning and really help kids to have math confidence. Do you and your child jump for math?

For Part #1 of Math on the Playground, check out yesterday’s post.

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