Today I want to share a spider counting book! It’s something I’ve used (in some variation or another) for many years, in both kindergarten and preschool. It’s a great Halloween math activity that the children enjoy making.
make a spider book for halloween math fun
Amazon links to comparable materials below.
Materials
Blank spider books
Washable ink pad
Markers
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Prep
Make the appropriate number of copies of “My Spider Book”. Cut the pages in half, then staple into one mini book. I created a book that went from 1 to 5, but you can add more pages for more numbers.
Write the child’s name on the front cover, or have the child write her name. The same goes for the numbers on each page. This time around, I chose to write the numbers for the children. I plan on keeping the books in their book boxes so the students can reread the books in class. Therefore, I wanted to ensure the number formation was correct. In the past, I’ve had students write the numbers or I’ve written the numbers in yellow and the children have traced over the numbers in pencil.
Directions
1. Introduce the book – “We’re going to make a book about counting spiders!”
2. Open to the first page, then ask what number we start with when counting. Write the number 1 on the appropriate space, and explain that a 1 goes from top to bottom.
3. Read through the words on the first page – “I see 1 spider.”
4. Have the child press his finger into a stamp pad, then onto the page. After the body is created with his fingerprint, have the child add eight legs to the “spider” using a marker. About half of the kiddos gave their spiders the correct amount of legs. I wasn’t really concerned about that, though!
5. Reread the words on the first page.
6. Repeat steps 2 through 5 for the rest of the pages. Ensure that the appropriate number of “spiders” are shown on each page.
A Few Tips
Keep some baby wipes on hand. This way, the children can remove the ink from their fingers as needed.
Encourage the children to place their spiders where they can see them. The illustrations act a “clues” when a child is learning to read, so the kids need to see the correct number of spiders on each page when they’re rereading.
What Halloween math activities do your children enjoy?
The free printable version of the book can be found HERE. It’s a 2-page PDF document.
Pop over to my Halloween Pinterest board for more ideas.
My Math Pinterest board is worth a look, too!
[…] were planets. This was a great math and early literacy activity from Fun-a-Day! I printed the free spider counting book, and my son stamped spiders in each web using his thumb. After he counted them, I wrote the […]