Early learning goals
Use developing mathematical ideas and methods to solve practical problems.
In practical activities and discussion begin to use the vocabulary involved in adding and subtracting (Curriculum guidance for the Foundation Stage, pages 74 and 76).
Playing with money helps children learn essential mathematical concepts.
They begin to identify different coins by colour, shape, size and weight, as well as recognising the numerals embossed on the surface. They learn that these distinctive numerals also determine the value of each coin. They discover how money is used in our society to buy commodities, and they learn to transfer any knowledge already acquired about simple addition and subtraction to the practical problems of using money.
If early years practitioners remember to address these concepts step by step when they plan their programme, children are less likely to become confused in their thinking. Use the stepping stones to guide you and to ensure that new concepts are introduced in an enjoyable and effective way.
Ensure that you build on children's experience and provide practical opportunities for them to learn new skills.
1 Small change
Introduce money in its simplest form at this stage by using only one-pence coins. Use plastic money sometimes and real money at other times, so children become used to handling real coins. This activity familiarises children with money, enables them to transfer it from one purse to another, helps them to understand one-to-one correspondence, and develops their vocabulary in describing money, purses and fasteners.
Good practice
* Gather together a wide selection of purses that look interesting and are stimulating to touch and investigate. You can find purses that are made from a wide variety of coloured fabrics and natural and man-made materials.
Also include purses with different kinds of fasteners, such as clasps, press studs and ties.
* Place five one-pence pieces in each purse, lay out the purses on a tray and leave it on a shelf that is accessible to children in the mathematical area.
* Invite a small group of children to play with the purses and investigate the contents.
* Enter into conversation with the children and encourage them to discover how to open and close the purses, to look inside and find the coins.
* Act as a role model by tipping out the money and counting aloud the number of coins: 'One, two, three, four, five pence.'
* Suggest children do the same and count with them. Replace the coins in the purse and close it.
* Encourage the children to search all the purses to look for money and count the coins. Let them play in this fashion as long as they like, putting the money in and taking it out and pouring all the coins into a pile in front of them.
* Then challenge them to put all the money correctly back into the purses and close them tightly before replacing them in the tray.
* This repetitive handling of the purses and the need to count out five one-pence coins for each purse provides children with useful practical experience of simple counting and addition of one to five.
2 Shopping with money
Most children love playing shops because they can use previous experience of family shopping. In this shopping activity, children learn through role play to associate price tags with the value of the coins in their purses.
It also helps to develop their confidence in using the quantitative, technical and descriptive language of money and shopping and makes them more conscious of the function of shops in our daily lives.
Good practice
* Choose any sort of shop that fits with your programme or topic. A mini-supermarket is a good choice because it allows you to provide a range of foods that are familiar to children, such as packaged and tinned food, fresh fruit and vegetables.
* Prepare an area of the class that gives children space to circulate.
* Provide shelving for products as well as tables on which to display fruit and vegetables.
* You may wish to use real fruit and vegetables, or plastic ones. Devise the activity so that children learn the correct names of many varieties of fresh and packaged foods.
* Provide a checkout desk with a till, a pretend scanner and a conveyor belt.
* Provide play shopping trolleys, baskets and bags and make accessible props and dressing-up clothes, such as hats and coats, handbags, purses and pushchairs.
* Again at this stage use only one-pence coins in the till and the purses.
* Label all the food for sale with clear and simple price tags, showing prices up to ten pence.
* Encourage children to play in the shop and to take turns on the checkout and as customers.
* Initiate the role play by reading stories about shopping expeditions to remind children about the experiences, characters and language of shopping.
* Encourage children to count out the one-pence coins as they pay for items they wish to buy.
* Help them work out how many more pence they may need to pay for a purchase and introduce language into the transactions, such as, 'How many more one-pence coins will you need to make five pence? And how much money will you have left when you have paid two pence for that potato?'
* Encourage them to enter wholeheartedly into the play and to develop their own scenarios as they go along.
3 Recognising & sorting coins
When children begin to have a better understanding of the value of the one-pence coin, and have grasped the idea of one-to-one correspondence, they can be challenged with more complicated concepts and introduced to a wider range of coins.
This activity introduces children to other coins in the currency, increases their experience by using plastic and real money and helps them to recognise and name a variety of coins. It also encourages them to work together and to take turns.
Good practice
* Make a set of four A4 laminated cards. On each mark out 12 squares in which you can place pictures of each side of the following six coins: 1p, 2p, 10p, 20p and 50p.
* Place a bag full of these coins in the centre of a table and invite four children at a time to play together.
* Encourage children to take turns to pull a coin from the bag, name it and place it the correct square on the card.
* Draw their attention to the details of the markings on each side of the coins.
* Support them to help each other identify the coins. The more they are handled, the more familiar children will become with them.
4 Adding and subtracting
Once children have developed a good understanding of one-to-one correspondence and have begun to recognise different coins, they should begin to appreciate that each coin represents a different value. Continue to provide practical activities that stimulate their interest in learning how to solve simple problems of addition and subtraction and develop mathematical lang-uage to describe these transactions.
Good practice
* Use the tray of purses that you have assembled previously. This time put a selection of small coins in them, using only 1p, 2p, 5p and 10p coins.
* Play a game with a couple of children at a time. Ask them to open a purse and take out the money. Give them time to count the money with your help.
* Play a game of exchange, showing that you will give them a 2p coin, if one of them can find two 1p coins to exchange with you.
* Repeat the process again and again, counting up coins, showing how to make equivalent exchanges and inviting children to work out demands of their own. This play will increase their familiarity with handling money and make negotiating a great deal of fun.
* Prompt them if needed to use the appropriate language to describe the currency exchanges they are making.
These exercises will be such fun for children and will challenge them to practise developing mathematical skills. In this way they will learn to handle money and make simple calculations.