It's time to play ball!!

I love teaching through play. I believe it's the most effective way to teach toddlers and preschoolers!

For today's game, I grabbed my bag of 100 colored balls, emptied 6 containers in different sizes and taped a piece of colored construction paper on the front of each one.

To begin, I called out the name of one child and instructed him/her as to how many balls and in what color I wanted him/her to collect.

"Max, please collect 5 orange balls."

Next, the children were told to drop the balls in the correct bucket.

As they dropped their balls they were asked,

"How many balls are you putting into the bucket?"

"What color are they?"

After children had the hang of that part of the game, I started asking them to collect different balls in different numbers.

For instance, "Max, please collect 3 orange balls along with 2 pink balls."

Once he collected the appropriate balls, I asked him,

"How many balls do you have all together?"

The children would then have to divide their colored balls and place them in the appropriate spot.

When the games were over, each child was given a bucket to collect and was responsible for putting them away.

It's a fun way to teach colors, addition and sorting skills!