Counting [1-5] : Grain Bins & Cupcakes

I've been having a little bit of a hard time getting Henry to want to do any kind of activity lately.

Especially anything that's remotely educational.

I brainstormed, trying to figure out what he'd like to do, but still work in some numbers.

This is what I came up with :

Counting with Grain Bins

I numbered five empty baby food jars.

[I'm overstocked right now, but I'm finding lots of uses for them lately. 

What do you use them for?]

I numbered both the sides and the lids of the jars 

with matching colored paper.

[I only did five so Henry wouldn't get overwhelmed, 

since he seems to be struggling with counting.]

I filled each jar with the corresponding number of marshmallows.

[I did this to show Henry the number to begin with so he wasn't expected to know it.]

I set out Henry's track tractor and wagon 'grain cart' along with the grain truck.

Henry's a farmer to the bone, 

so I figured this would get him more involved.

It did.

I set out a toothpick, as well, with the intention for him to poke the marshmallows 

to transfer from the 'grain bins' to the grain cart.

This wasn't fast enough for Henry, so he just dumped the bins out.

Henry loaded up his grain cart with all five bins worth of marshmallows corn.

Then transfered the corn to the grain truck.

Which then hauled the corn back to the bins.

When it was time to unload into the bins :

 Henry unscrewed each lid off, 

filled up each bin until it was 'full' (to the correct number), 

then quickly found the matching lid and screwed it back on.

[nice work for the fine motor skills, my toothpick idea didn't work, but this did.]

Henry had no problems with counting 1-3. 

At 4 he added a few too many.

When he got to 5, he realized he didn't have enough and was puzzled.

So, I redirected him back to 4 to recount.

He hauled the corn from bin to grain cart to grain truck a few times, 

until he eventually ate all his corn.

[He then found Cheerios beans to haul and did the same.]

I also found this nice printable for counting : 

Counting Cupcakes at FileFolderFun 

[same place where I found the ABC = abc matching printable.]

Henry pretty easily matched up the 

numbered cupcakes with the 'sprinkled' cupcakes.

[they're actually cherries on the cupcakes, 

but to make it more fun and easier for Henry to understand, 

I called them sprinkles.]

Henry first tried matching their colors, 

but the colors weren't right to match 

and he quickly understood that he needed to count them. 

He still struggled a little with 4 and 5. 

The printable includes cupcakes up to 10, 

but to keep Henry from getting frustrated, 

I only used 1-5.

I'm glad to have found a way to include Henry's interests in counting. 

Hauling anything is always a hit with him - 

the Grain Bin activity wasn't solely focused on counting, 

so it was much more fun for him.

And me too.

   - Henry is about 35 months -