handprint counting

A close up of our handprint project.

Dylan has been really into Starfall.com.  We recently discovered another layer to Starfall called More Starfall.  It's a subscription service and its only $35 for the year.  What I like about it is that it adds a math component (regular Starfall is literacy based).  One of Dylan's favorite parts is when they count to 100s using handprints.  So, I thought that we could recreate that the old-fashioned way–using paper and paint.

We pulled out the paints and a roll of paper and Dylan didn't mind getting his hands all messy to make 10 sets of handprints.  After the handprints dried, he used a marker to number each of the fingers and thumbs all the way to 100.  Then we counted by 5s and wrote on the palms of each hand.  I didn't get a photo of the process as it took my involvement (and I forgot).  The chart came out really cute and he likes to look at it and count (and do his hands as if he was making handprints in the air).

For those of you with younger kids, you could easily do this on a smaller scale and just do the 1-10 to start with.