Think cereal is just for breakfast?? Well think again! Cereal, while being a delicious breakfast or a great snack can also be a learning tool! Encouraging children to observe patterns is an important, pre-math skill that helps them make sense of what they see, hear and learn.Patterns teach children how things work together and allow them to predict what comes next. These skills, in turn, can help children become problem solvers.
Child development research shows that unless we help children find meaning in what they see and experience, learning will not take place. The brain seeks patterns from birth through life. But if you want your child’s brain to work to its maximum, you have to provide the right activities.
Here are some fun things you and your child can do with breakfast cereal to facilitate learning.
1. Using round cereal in different colors and a piece of yarn, make a necklace to wear. (You can use a small piece of yarn or a pipe cleaner to make a bracelet to
alleviate choking concerns.) Help your child notice similarities and differences in patterns on her string. Ask them to tell the colors and shapes of the string and cereals.
2. Make piles of different colors. Have your child duplicate your piles of cereal. Take a piece of paper and right the numbers from 1 to 5. Place the corresponding pieces of cereal to the number. Be sure to tell your child, "This is one fruit loop. it is red, these are two fruit loops. They are yellow." And so on.
3. Get out your cupcake pan. Give your child 20 or more Cheerios or Fruit Loops and let them place some in each cup. Then you and your child count how many are in each cup. Talk about more and less. Ask you child which cup of cereal would they like to eat. Do they want to eat more or less. They will figure out in no time the cup with more is better!
4. Take a piece of paper and put the colors of the cereal on the paper. Have the child match the colors. Repeat color names. Use mathematical terms such as first, second third. Ask you child what do you think comes next?
5. Give your child three different empty water bottles. Have them drop Fruit Loops or Cheerios into them. Count as they drop them in. Talk about the different colors. "You just put one red one in the bottle. Now lets shake the cereal out of the bottle" (Bonus! You are teaching the spatial concepts such as in and out, up and down.( Ask them to sort the cereal into three colors and put place each color into the bottles. (Another bonus! your child is learning to use their small muscles when putting the cereal in the bottle)
Encouraging toddlers to notice, experiment and play with patterns will sow the seeds of logical thinking, problem-solving and reasoning. Children also can spell better when they are taught to notice the patterns in sounds and meaning of words.
There you go. Who knew there was so much fun hiding in a box of cereal? Now go have fun!
