Counting our Freezie Stand Money!

After our month of freezie stand sales, it was time to finally determine the fruits of our labor! They grabbed their piggy banks and eagerly ripped the bottoms open knowing that once they knew how much money they had, they could finally buy their own toys.

They first grouped them into their respective denominations-reinforcing the physical characteristics of money grouping and discriminating for both:

For each one, I made a table so they had access to a visible numerical value as we were counting in order to continue to make the connection between the coins and the numbers they represent:

I know that they are both a little young to grasp the concepts of decimals just yet, but just by having them there to see it becomes an informal introduction to decimals with the association of money-theoretically making it easier to introduce formally later on as they have some sort of previous knowledge of them going in-even if it is as simple as seeing them before!

Although I recognize that my littlest one may still be working on the actual concrete representation of adding 5 more or counting by 5's (or 10's etc.), this activity is, at the very least, numerical pattern recognition for her along with the concept that objects can hold numerical value:

For the not-so-littlest one, he is still working on counting quarters but has just reached the point where he does not need to group them into 4 to count by dollars. The rest he can no do with ease, so we are working on adding multiple sums both verbally and on paper. We do them one after the other, so the numbers on paper hold a concrete physical representation in his head.

The verdict?
Littlest one-$39.80 and Not-so-littlest one-$41.09

This included their allowance, maybe a few dollars if that, him a little more than her by nature of their responsibilities.

The conclusion they ended up coming too?

"We make way more with the freezie stand, you should give us more money for allowance or we should just do freezie stands and not chores"

Dammit.