Small amounts you just KNOW

Look at the dots on a dice. You don't count them one-by-one — you just know it's 3, or 5. That clever skill is called subitising.

Count your fingers

One whole hand is 5. Two hands are 10. Your fingers are a number line you carry everywhere!

Hold up 4 fingers. Now 7. Now 10. Fingers help us SEE how big a number is.

The ten frame

A ten frame has ten boxes. Filling it up helps us see how close a number is to 10.

This shows 6. Can you see it needs 4 more to fill up to 10?

Every number is made of smaller numbers

The number 5 can be made in lots of ways: 4 and 1, 3 and 2, or one whole hand. This is called the composition of a number.

Try it with bricks: take 5 bricks and split them into two piles. How many ways can you find?

You are a number explorer!

Now you know that numbers tell us how many, that you can SEE small amounts without counting, and that big numbers are made of smaller ones.

Go on a number hunt! How many cups are on the table? How many stairs to your room? Numbers are everywhere.