NONE  IS  ZERO

These days, during story time at the  library , the lovely librarians make it a point to read book or do finger play around the concept of reverse counting. Simply put, we do stuff like “ five little monkeys jumping on a bed” or “ five apples on a tree” , removing one item at a time and thus encouraging the toddlers to count reverse. Right at the end, we finish with “none”. I have been wanting to teach my son, the concept of zero. I was trying to figure  out how to teach this concept.  I tried this method and it worked for us.

• Give your child 2-3 cars or candies or any other thing that  they like. Remove one item at a time. Encourage them to count backwards. When you remove all the items, ask your child how many are left? Explain that when there is none left, we call it zero.
•  Reinforce the concept of zero on a daily basis. If you give two cookies or few oranges or anything that can be counted, ask your child when it is done, how many are they left with. They will get around understanding that zero represents the absence of anything.

This was a big deal for us.  U (that is how m going to refer to my son, henceforth in the blog 
J) loves showing off that he knows zero now. Try teaching this to your toddler who is learning number.