Julie Modson

CCD 116 Tuesday 12:30-3:22pm

Winter 2015
Cognitive Activity
Cognitive abilities are brain-based skills which are needed to carry out any given
task, whether easy or difficult. These skills include perception, decision making,
motor skills, language skills, and social skills.
Activity Name:
Age group:

Counting Apples

Early Childhood

Instructions:

Each child will choose a farmer with various hats numbered 1-15.

Have the child choose a hat and tell you what number it says.

Then the child will place the hat on top of the farmers head so they can
recall what number they chose.

After saying number and placing on top of the farmers head, the child will
then make the same number of apples out of play-dough, as listed on the hat,
and place them in the basket next to the farmer.

If the child is unsure if they placed the right about of apples on in the basket,
the child can then count each apple that was placed into the basket for recall
or check what they did and have a chance to correct themselves.

Rationale:
Children will be able to recall numbers one to fifteen and place play-dough
apples accordingly in the basket for fine motor development.

Reflection:

Upon having my 3 and 5 year old cousins have fun with this at their home, I
noticed a few things. The 5 year old was able to recognize the value of the larger
numbered hat more so than the 3 year old. The 3 year old was able to complete the
easier numbers (<10) and steered away from the larger numbers. Though he could
count past ten, he didnt recognize the written form of the number as the 5 year old
did. The older child also was able to verbally say all numbers and knew that the 15
hat was the largest and more difficult. Additionally, the younger child didnt check
his work as often as the older child did. For example, he would do the number 3
and place three apples into the basket. He didnt count out the apples until he
chose the larger numbers. Lastly, the older child stayed longer at the activity than
the younger child due to curiosity rather than frustration.

For future teachings, I would have up to 5 farmers and make more play-dough
in order to have enough for a small group setting. I would also have more diverse
farmers than the ones I currently have due to materials I had in my home. Lastly a
variety in play-dough color like dark green and light green would be a nice visual of
various apple colors.