How many hands?

From the house

• Their hands and yours
• A wooden spoon
• Paper and a pencil (optional)

How to play

1. Pick something to measure: the table, the sofa, their bed.
2. They lay their hands flat along it, one after the other with no gaps, while you count together.
3. Now measure it with your bigger hands: why is your number smaller?
4. Try the wooden spoon end to end: more spoons or more hands?

Fit it to your child

• Easier: Measure short things, like a book or a pillow, and count up to five.
• Harder: Guess first and write the guess down, then measure and see how close it was.

Words to use

• long
• longer
• measure
• how many
• no gaps

Why it helps

Laying hands end to end with no gaps is exactly what a ruler does, and your smaller number shows them that the size of the unit matters.