Childcare Activities

Counting Watermelon Seeds

Table of Contents

If you’re reading The Watermelon Seed with your preschoolers this summer, help them practice math and literacy skills with these free The Watermelon Seed activities.

Learning Objective

Reads, writes, and represents numbers 0 to 10
Counts a set of objects to 10
Recognizes small groups of objects
Generates a set equal to a number
Composes numbers to 10

Age Group

3 year and above

Materials required

Printed watermelon slices
Buttons of different colors
Glue

Activity guide

Ask your students to begin placing buttons on the printable watermelon slices. Start with single color buttons and work your way up the watermelon.
Count the number of buttons students placed in the first layer.
Don’t worry about gaps in the first layer. You’ll be able to patch them with glue.
Take buttons of another color and start with the second layer.
Then, count the number of buttons used to create the second layer.
Try to hide the spaces where the printable is visible.
Cover the red with two to three layers of buttons, depending on your preference.
Save any unique-looking buttons for the top layer, where they will be visible.
For reflection, count from 0 to 10 with the rest of the class repeating the numbers after you.
To recapitulate, recount the numbers for the class and ask them to raise the number of buttons that match the number you speak

Relevance of the activity

This activity will help the children identify a consistent word order; count items in sets and recall counting from 0 to 10.

Observation Checklist

OBSERVATION CHECKLIST
Cognitive Skill	Yes	No
Did the student race through the activity?
Did the student change activities before finishing the task?
Did the student complete the task at hand before moving on to the next task?
Was the student able to transition between tasks?
Did the student need time to warm up to the activity before joining in?
Did the student comprehend instructions?
Did the student follow the instructions?
Did the student cooperate with others?
Did the student have difficulty making transitions?
Did the student participate in activity closure and/or recall?
Did the student apply the activity to any real-life situation?

Share the knowledge

Does counting appear to be difficult? What we adults consider easy can actually be difficult for children because their cognitive functions are still developing. It is important to keep a track of the activities you do with children to assess their growth. Which is why you have Illumine.

Illumine is a daycare app with state-of-the-art features designed to help daycare owners perform at their best potential. The app makes planning lessons a straightforward, quick and seamless process with its lesson planning software which saves 3 hours per day of teaching staff on manual tasks. This leaves teachers with a lot of time to imbue creativity in their activities and teach children counting in varied ways.