I have always assumed that the basic notions of maths for a young child would be: a) learning to say the number in the correct order, b) counting objects, c) recognizing written numbers, and then you would just go on to add, subtract, etc.
When I had my first child (and after he got to an age that allowed me to) I did read something about my fellow Italian Maria Montessori, and learned that there's much more to early Maths, and that it is a lot "earlier" than I had envisaged.
The fact that Yusef was obsessed with pans and lids, with opening and closing tubs, filling them with things, taking everything out again ... was actually him practicing some of the skills that lay at the very foundation of Mathematics and Geometry!
Recently I discovered other skills that I wouldn't necessarily have immediately associated with Maths before: patters and symmetry! So here we are a couple of months ago, takign a step back from counting things, learning about patterns with the 3 bears family counters (we actually bought the tub of bears, the sorting bowls and the pattern cards separately off ebay, it was slightly cheaper. It is a little expensive but we used them for various things so far masha'Allah)
Some online games that involve patterns and symmetry can be found on the Starfall website although if I remember correctly you need to register for them. Yusef loves them masha'Allah.
...I need to think about something creative to implement symmetry... watch this space in sha'Allah!
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