Monday, 19 September 2016

Learning Resources Farm Counting Set - Review and Giveaway




When Learning Resources asked if I would like to select something to review from them, the first thing that came to mind was something that could help Lily learn her colours. Lately she has been really interested in learning her colours and also doing really well with them. So I had a good browse on the website to see what I could find that would help her with that.

I decided that I wanted something that was about sorting and so found this farm counting set that came with little farm animals in different colours.

The set came and arrived in a handy little storage tub that also has a handle on so Lily can carry it around. She did exactly this and was carrying it around until we were ready to take it out and play. I wanted to make playing with the counters a controlled activity so we didn't loose any pieces and also it will help aid her learning a lot more that way. 




One thing I love about this set of counters is that it can be used in so many different ways and you can do quite a few learning activities with them. You can help learn colours, counting, sorting and patterning. 

We are obviously learning colours at the moment and so thats what we concentrated on the most. The set of counters comes in 6 different colours and so the first thing I thought to do was to pour them all out into a big pile. This way I wanted Lily to be able to search through them to find the colours. 

Lily so far is best with blue. She knows how to say the word and can easily spot it from the rest. So we started here by asking her to pick up blue from the pile. Easily done. She actually did really well with most the colours apart from orange which was a little tricky for her. 



(please excuse the Photo Bombing cat in the background haha) 

After this activity we decided to organise the colours into piles. This is something we definetly need work on as although she does know the colours she struggled to understand the concept of putting them into piles. But I know that practice makes perfect and soon enough she will know which pile to put each colour into. One thing I did try later was to get out some coloured bowls we have and she understood the concept more of putting the right colours into the matching coloured bowl. I would love to be able to buy this set with matching coloured bowls and if I had the option between a set with sorting bowls or just a tub of animals I would quite happily pay the extra to have the set with the matching bowls. You can buy bowls from the Learning Resources website separately though if you wanted them.


After this we tried counting. Lily doesn't know her numbers yet but understands the concept of counting and will make a noise each time she counts. We decided to count out the animals into lines into there colours. So a row of blue, a row of red. You get the idea. There was 12 of each colour which is a great number to count to. Though the great thing about this is that you don't have to use all 12 and could start with a lower number and count to 3. 



The last activity we did was sorting them into the groups of animals. There were 6 different farm animals. Ducks, Goats, Sheep, Pigs, Horses and Cows. This was a little tricky for Lily yet to understand the concept of grouping them together but i'm sure as she gets older she will pick it up. She did quite easily pick out the ducks though and know that it was a duck. The only thing I found with the animals is that some look very similar in shape. Even I kept putting the goats with the horses when not looking properly and so I think a child would really have to concentrate to get the correct animal. 



One last activity I thought about doing with these is sorting them into a pattern. For example you could do Red, Blue, Red, Blue. We didn't try this activity as its a little advanced for Lily's age but a great way to move on from grouping the colours into one colour.

It really is brilliant that this one tub of colourful animals can really provide so much variety in fun and learning. They can also be used for imaginative play if you wanted to.

The animals are all wipe clean and are 6cm in height. They are recommended for children aged 3 Plus. Lily is under the recommended age and I wouldn't let her play with these without my supervision because of how small they are. Although Lily no longer puts things into her mouth. There is also the factor she would most likely loose them if I let her play with them by herself at the moment.

You can buy a set of 24 or a set of 72. The set of 24 is £7 and the set of 72 is £17. I would really recommend a set of these for your child's early years learning. You can also check out other sorting set thats Learning Resources has to offer on the website here

Your also in luck as Learning Resources is letting me give away one tub of these counters. For your chance to win enter on the Gleam app below

Win a Set of Farm Counters

83 comments:

  1. These will be fab for learning to count!

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  2. All three - and sequencing too/creating patterns!

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  3. Colours he gets muddled up with these

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  4. Colours he gets muddled up with these

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  5. I think we'd wait until we got them out and decide what we wanted to do first, but we wouldn't do just one thing with them.

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  6. sorting - its always fun (kim styles)

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  7. My little boy loves sorting so that would be his first choice I think.

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  8. I think it would be the colours for now :)

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  9. These look great for all 3. I am currently trying to teach my daughter colours. She has health issues and is unable to talk, but we are learning the Makaton signs for colours, and these would be perfect to help with that. xxx

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  10. these are very cool and never seen something like these before

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  11. Creating patterns would be our thing I think! Dxx

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  12. My daughter just turned 4, so I think I'd focus on different ways of sorting and creating patterns.

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  13. These are a great idea, seems so obvious and simple, yet I had never thought of using this type of toy! I think it would be great to advance my little man's counting and potentially get in to early sums.

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  14. id start of with counting I think

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  15. First step colours & sorting then shapes & patterns then we will move to count as my little one is a bit young

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  16. Lily seems to have everything down already - counting, sorting, colours. See what you mean about them being small so you have to be careful the younger ones don't try to eat them but it's amazing how quickly they grow out of doing that. I tend to keep a watch anyway as I'm ultra cautious..probably too much so? ;)

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  17. They will be for my 20 month old, so would use them for the basics: colour recognition and sorting. Then extend the activity to suit as she gets older :)

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  18. I'd use them for teaching my daughter about counting

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  19. I think it would be great and a fun way for the child to learn to count

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  20. I think these would help with counting

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  21. it would be creating patterns and sorting for us, my girls are 2 and 3, very good with counting and colours but always good to keep going over them :)

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  22. Will be great for counting. A fun way to learn.

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  23. I would use them for colours

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  24. i would use them to help with counting with my son

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  25. Counting I'd say, youngest would probably mostly play with them but the boys could use them as an aid when doing heir homework too

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  26. I'd use it for learning counting and colours.

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  27. Colours and counting

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  28. My son uses these at school so we would be using them to back up his counting and maths at home.

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  29. They'd be great for learning colours & counting!

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  30. Grouping and creating patterns, these look like fantastic learning tools.

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  31. I would give them to my great niece who is 2, and I know that her older sister (7) would have them lined up in colours, count them and teach her sister

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  32. this would be brilliant for Counting

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  33. I reckon a bit of everything, but we'd probably start with counting because my 19 month old is already showing an interest in that.

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  34. Counting would be brilliant for our preschool girlie but would also be useful for simple maths - adding and subtracting - great way to explain how maths works. They look fab!

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  35. would be good for sorting colours and counting

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  36. I'd like to use them for counting and addition

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  37. would probably use them for counting

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  38. Claire Elizabeth Noke11 October 2016 at 10:21

    counting initially... but probably all of the above when she gets older :)

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  39. This would be to help my son learn to count, he has autism and is home educated so they'd be really helpful.

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  40. I would use them for all four activities. They are fabulous!

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  41. Well all of them, & the names of the animals, but initially colours💕 What a fun learning toy🙉

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  42. Would love to use these counters to help my son learn colours and counting!

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  43. creating patterns

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  44. Think we'd start with colours as most things are red at the moment...even if they're not! :)

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  45. I Would use it for counting and colours, such a fab product

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  46. Counting as my grandson is fascinated with counting at the moment would be good to start basic maths in a fun way :-)

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  47. These are fab, so many possible uses! Colours and counting would be good for us.

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  48. this would be brilliant for my baby boy to learn counting

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  49. This would be perfect for my nephew to learn to count and create patterns. Thank you for the chance xxx

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  50. Think we would use them for counting and patterns

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  51. Definitely colours, Tyler struggles with them at the moment

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  52. my little granddaughter is 18 months old, so at this age I think the sorting by colours would be a good activity, then we could also try sorting by type of animal. She's a bit young for counting, but I like that this toy has lots of learning possibilities suitable as the child gets older.

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  53. For all 3- and of course speech development as the tasks are undertaken. Would be wonderful to use in creative storytelling too :-)

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  54. For learning colours and counting

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  55. My son is obsessed with animals - he would love sorting the colours and then arranging them in long lines and patterns!

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  56. what a great Idea for learning to count

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  57. Pauline Burroughs21 October 2016 at 18:32

    Colours

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  58. counting as my granddaughter knows her colours

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  59. Colours first as my granddaughter is 3. Then we would more on to sorting, then counting.

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  60. These will be fab for learning to count! xx

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  61. I used to love these types of visual toys when I was little and I think they're so important x

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  62. I love that there are so many different ways to sort the animals!

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  63. I love that there are so many different ways to sort the animals

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