Math | Kindergarten Cafe

Kindergarten Cafe

Welcome to Kindergarten Cafe - your home for teaching ideas, activities, and strategies across all content areas! I am Zeba McGibbon and I love creating resources for teachers and sharing my teaching experience with others. Kindergarten Cafe is aimed for kindergarten, but teachers of Preschool-First grade can find resources here for their students! I love to connect with other teachers so please reach out and say hello!

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Holidays

Earth Day Magic in Kindergarten ~ Ep. 30

Zeba McGibbon

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Math

Loving Teaching While Using New Curriculum ~ Ep. 29

Zeba McGibbon

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PODCAST

The Chick Life Cycle Unit is Pure Kindergarten Magic

Zeba McGibbon

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Early Childhood Education

Child-Led Play and Learning with Melysa from PRE-K Spot Talks ~ Ep. 27

Zeba McGibbon

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PODCAST

What to Do When a Child Won’t Stop Crying ~ Ep. 26

Zeba McGibbon

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Exploring and Understanding 3-D Shapes

Classroom Activities and LessonsZeba McGibbon

In the fall, one of our first math units is all about 2-D shapes. But now that the year is moving along, my students are ready for a deep dive into 3-D shapes. I love helping them to investigate the 3D shapes and their...

One More One Less

Classroom Activities and LessonsZeba McGibbon

Number relations is a huge understanding for kindergarteners – they need to know how the numbers fit together. They need to know what number will come next or what number came first, without having to count all the way to that number to figure it out. They...

Addition and Subtraction

Classroom Activities and LessonsZeba McGibbon

Teaching addition and subtraction is a huge part of kindergarten math and there are a lot of fun ways to teach it! I love to use books, games, and real word problems to teach and practice addition and subtraction. Check out my Addition and...

Teaching Number Relationships

MathZeba McGibbon

I’ve written a few blog posts about counting and teen numbers, but today I want to write about my favorite activities for developing an understanding of number relationships. In the common core math standards, kindergarten students must be able to “count forward beginning from...

Teaching Shapes in Kindergarten

MathZeba McGibbon

Teaching shapes in kindergarten is one of my favorite math topics all year! I love all the fun activities I can do with my students. I introduce 2D shapes towards the beginning of the year so that all students understand the basic vocabulary. Also,...

Tricks for Teaching Teen Numbers

MathZeba McGibbon

Once students have a strong foundation of counting and identifying numbers to 10, teen numbers are the next big understanding for them in developing number sense. Teen numbers are especially tricky because they are the first numbers they encounter that have two digits....

One to One Correspondence Interventions

MathZeba McGibbon

One of the very foundational skills for kindergarten math is one to one correspondence. In my school, our goal is for students to be able to count up to 32 objects by the end of kindergarten. This benchmark encompasses several key components that students...

Kindergarten Subitizing Routines and Activities

Classroom Activities and LessonsZeba McGibbon

What is subitizing and why should I teach it? Subitizing is looking at a group of objects and knowing how many are there, without individually counting each one. It is a key skill for children to learn and practice, as it helps develop...

Kindergarten Math lesson for Establishing Routines

MathZeba McGibbon

Starting up routines at the beginning of the year can be a daunting task if you are not sure what you want the routine to look like (for more information check out this previous blog post on the first week of kindergarten). For teaching...

Numberless Word Problems

MathZeba McGibbon

When teaching my students to solve word problems, I love starting with numberless word problems. I learned this strategy a few years ago at a math conference. Numberless word problems help students to practice figuring out what problem they are solving by asking important...