I always believe adorable Counting Bears are excellent classroom or home manipulatives for my students. They can be utilized in a wide range of activities for young children up until kindergarten, at the very least.
They can aid in the development of several abilities, such as fundamental math ➗️ abilities, color and number recognition, and fine motor skills.
Interesting Counting Bear Activities
You can use the bears by themselves or with different printable activities. The adorable teddy bears 🧸, which come in a variety of vibrant colors, are a hit with children.
Color Sorting
I found this color-sorting activity very straightforward and engaging. You can either simply arrange the three pages as is or cut out each color bear🧸.
Have your youngster connect the bears to the big bears of the right color using a few scoops of bears. Large circles made of paper 📃 toweling in the appropriate colors are another option.
Color Match
I suggest you an alternative method for matching colors. Your youngster will pair one bear with every circle of an identical color rather than just sorting them by color.
As they attempt to raise each bear on its own little circle, this is a fantastic game 🎮 for fine motor abilities as well.
Sort By Color – Basic Graphing
I would recommend this fundamental graphing exercise in addition to being another color-sorting exercise. Your children can arrange the bears 🐻 in the squares either standing or lying down.
Once they have organized the bears you have given them, start asking them questions like:
How many blue bears did you have? 😉
Which color did you have the most of? 🤨
Which color did you have the least amount of?
What Comes Next? – Basic Patterns
I always prefer basic and simple activities for my students. This basic ABAB pattern is one of my favorite simple exercises. The first design your toddler 🧒 will learn to do these basic repeating patterns.
They can overlay the images with bears or simply add the two that they require at the end to finish the sequence.
To assist your youngster with concentrating on a single design at a time, try cutting the bear design cards 😀 apart. Undoubtedly, my 3-year-old needs some assistance with this one.
Count & Mark
I would tell you to ask your students to determine the bears 🐻 on the count and mark the worksheet before choosing the right answer. Following that, they can either X the number or mark it with a dab-a-dot marker.
These may also be used as count and clip cards after being cut apart and laminated. Have the youngster attach something to the right number, such as a clothespin.
Fine motor abilities are also greatly improved by using the clothespins.
Which has More?
I recommend this easy task, which provides a lot of fun while playing. Allow your kid to count each row of bears 🐻, then mark which row has the most bears.
Once more, repeat. This activity can easily be set up without the use of worksheets. Simply arrange two distinct sets of bears, preferably using two distinct colors.
Count each pair with your child and have them indicate the one with the most.
Trace & Count
I always encourage my kids to write ✍️ a lot because writing ✍️ numbers is greatly aided by the practice of number tracing. Your kid can begin to build the muscle recollection and pen control necessary to write numbers by tracing them using their finger or a real pencil.
If students want to start writing out arithmetic problems, they must become proficient in writing their numbers.
They can then add the appropriate number of bears to that area after tracing the number.
What Comes Next – Advanced Patterns
I always suggest my kids go for the simplest patterns.
These patterns, which cover the ABCABC, AABAAB, and ABB ABB patterns, are a little more complex.
To create patterns for your kid to follow, you may either use worksheets like those in my counting bears package or just your own bears or other objects.
Bear Graphing & Worksheet
Have you ever heard 🤔 about this activity? Then you will be very happy to have this activity here. The bears 🐻 were merely sorted by color in the preceding graphing exercise. We are now prepared to present it in a way closer to a graph.
Once they have sorted all the bears into their proper categories, assist your kid with reading the graph by moving over to the number and counting how many of each color bear there are.
Along with this, there is a worksheet where they can respond to some inquiries regarding their graph.
Counting on the Teddy Bear Bus
I would suggest you start by providing a 10-frame mat to each child. Next, set a number card close to the mat. Read the number afterward, then load that many bears inside the bus. Ask each youngster to count the teddies again once they are on the 🚌 bus.
Key fact
Encourage the children to touch each teddy bear just once while counting slowly. I make sure the children always say “one” when they touch the first bear, “two” when they touch the second bear, and so on.
Gameplay
A set of cards with numbers should first be arranged from left to right. Read each number after that, and then count the indicated number of numbering 🐻 bears below.
Gameplay –
Choose a number card to start with. Then, after reading the number, count out that many bears. In the end, try counting the bears in various configurations, such as a circle 🔵 or a scattered pattern.
SENSORY ACTIVITIES
My son always prefers sensory activities, and colorful bears should be used with sensory bins as well as other activities. If you want, you can add 🐻 bears frequently to the bean and foam-shaped sensory bins, and I am sure your toddlers will prefer it.
Your kid 🧒 will enjoy playing with different setups and can spend hours playing with beans and foam form fillers.
SCOOPING ACTIVITIES
I have always believed that scooping bears is a fantastic fine motor activity, regardless of whether the bears are in a sensory bin or are just dispersed on the floor.
Your kid knows how to use the scooping tongs that came with our set to gather her bears and place them in different containers.
I have practiced scooping with a variety of tongs and implements to improve my coordination and pre-writing abilities.
SPIN AND COVER GAMES
My young kids 🧒 like calling out the color, rolling the die, and selecting the right bear. I often take shifts rolling to assist her in developing her sharing and turn-taking skills.
Kids can play a “roll to cover” game as another more independent dice game. For these bears, I made a printable rainbow activity. My toddler enjoys 😀 placing the bears upon their respective colors on occasion, but she also enjoys rolling the dice 🎲 and placing them on the color that appears.
BINGO & BOARD GAMES
I’m not sure why Bing is so popular with young children, but I enjoy that Bing requires little talent and promotes taking turns as well as competing and losing politely.
On the internet, there are many printable Bingo Cards for sale. Click Google to see Rainbow 🌈 Bear Bingo Cards if you’re interested.
One-to-one correspondence
I recommend you mark the dots on the paper with markers or place stickers in the shape of the bears’ base. Enter the associated word and number.
Use it to teach students to recognize numbers and number words as well as one-to-one correspondence. If you intend to reuse those sheets, laminating them is a good idea.
Greater than, Less than, Equal to
I would request you lay out two piles of bears: one tiny and one huge. Which is larger, less, or equal? Ask your children.
Utilize these words frequently. The worksheets you made for exercise 6 might also be used for greater than and less than.
The Grizzly Bear Song
My children may learn about bears hibernating throughout the winter by singing a tune about a grizzly bear resting in a cave.
They will master the words and actions of a nice song with this one to help kids understand that bears 🐻 sleep in caves and that it is dangerous to disturb them.
Ten in the Bed
My kids love listening to music. In this timeless children’s song, counting bears will help children learn how to count from one to ten!
The entertaining animations in this movie will have kids singing and laughing along as they learn their numbers with each bear roll.
Brown Bear Song
Are you familiar with this story? Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? 🤨 is among the children’s stories that my kids adore. Then, your kids can practice their literacy skills by retelling this well-known tale; kids can practice their literacy skills.
Pro Tips
If you want, you can play this movie instead of repeatedly learning one of the cutest picture books, and your students will quickly learn the words!
Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear
Who doesn’t enjoy snuggling up with soft teddy bears at night? Use this tune to assist young children in relaxing and preparing for a nap or 🌙 bedtime. And keep in mind to offer them a cuddly version of their favorite teddy bear!
Look no further than A Guest for Bear if you’re seeking bear books that captivate all of your preschoolers. This endearing tale features an elderly bear who is cranky and has a sign that reads “no guests allowed,” but the small mouse is unfazed.
Bear Came Along
A library of bear-themed books would benefit greatly from the inclusion of this Caldecott Honour book with its exquisite pictures.
Preschoolers will discover the significance of each person’s unique talents as well as how they contribute to the team as a whole via adventure and encounters with a variety of woodland critters.
Brown Bear Mask
Make this entertaining brown bear mask after studying about them! Preschoolers can tell people interesting facts about brown bears while wearing their masks 🎭.
They can retell parts of the tale Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Exactly Do You See? Who doesn’t enjoy making and donning amusing masks, after all?
3 Part Cards
This enjoyable three-part card exercise is another fantastic activity that is available as a free printable.
Preschoolers will enjoy cutting out the various cards and sticking them into the appropriate spots as they discover a variety of interesting information about 🐻 bears.
Even when they are finished being created, you can hang these cool works of art to act as visual reminders!
Polar Bear Sight Words
With the help of these amusing polar bears, kids may learn the first 40 words on the Dolch sight phrase list.
Your children will quickly become master readers! To use these adorable cards for a long time, laminate them.
Sorting Bears
This exercise doubles as a matching exercise for colors and a counting exercise. Kids 🧒 won’t even be aware they are learning crucial skills because they will be having so much fun 😉 playing this color-matching game!
These bear counters can be put to a variety of uses.
Color By Number
You should add this to your library of preschool math worksheets. When kids can identify numbers by vision, have them color this adorable teddy bear 🧸 picture 📸 to reinforce their number learning!
Marshmallow Math
This delightful marshmallow math game is a wonderful addition to your selection of bear activities.
By asking kids to estimate how many marshmallows it will require to cover the polar bear completely, you may teach them the art of estimation.
Of course, they will enjoy this exercise once they get to eat the marshmallows!
Gummy Bear Math
Another practice that simultaneously strengthens several talents is this one. With this enjoyable exercise, preschoolers can work on counting, fine motor abilities, and color identification all at once, and when they’re done, they get to eat gummy bears!
Conclusion
I always believe students should be engaged in various activities because it will always give them plenty of opportunities to understand and develop their potential.
I hope all the mentioned activities will match your requirements, and if you have anything to add, please let us know in our comments section 😊.
I’m a former teacher (and mother of Two Childs) with a background in child development. Here to help you with play-based learning activities for kids. ( Check my Next startup Cledemy.Com)