Ten Frame Names

Subitizing is an important concept for developing young children's number sense. Being able to easily recognize quantity helps build children's confidence, accuracy, and fluency with numbers. 

One of the most important words a child first learns to read and write is his or her name. We decided to merge these two ideas into some rich math and literacy activities for our children. 

Our name cards for activities are written on ten frames so that children can count how many letters are in the names and recognize that each name is different. 

When we highlight a child's name on our morning message we often write it in a ten frame. We want children to immediately recognize how many letters are in the name and also realize that words like names are composed of letters. 

Our name 'word wall' is organized by the number of letters in each name. We used paint chips as the cards - each letter is written in its own space and the cards also help show different shades of the same colour. 

Today we invited the children to go on a name 'hunt' around the room. Papers with photos and ten frames were offered to the children and they searched for each name, writing on the corresponding ten frame.