Thirty preschool games now let children move the things they are counting
Many of the youngest children's number games used to be small quizzes: read a sentence, look at a row of pictures, tap a word. Thirty of them have been rebuilt so that the child does the maths with their own fingers: they push groups together, take objects away, hand things out, pack pairs and sort a messy pile. Every game works in English and French from the same moment.
How it feels. A game now shows real objects in a few clear places, such as a pile, a plate, a tray, two hands or a row of friends. Tapping an object sends it to the next place, tapping it again brings it back, and dragging works too. One Done button checks the result. There is almost nothing to read: a short instruction of a few words, spoken aloud in the app.
| Place | What children do there |
|---|---|
| Two trays and a third tray | Put two groups together, or pair them up one to one |
| A pile and a bin | Take some away and see what is left |
| A plate | Give exactly the number asked for |
| Two hands | Split a handful, then find another way |
| Friends in a row | Deal fairly, or give each friend one cup |
| Columns and bins | Sort a mixed pile, then count each group |
Comparing, sharing and graphing. The last four games in this batch tackle ideas that were hardest to teach with a quiz.
- More, fewer or the same. Two groups sit side by side and the child pairs them one to one. What is left over is the extra, so the child sees why one group has more instead of guessing from which row looks longer. Equal groups, and groups that differ by just one, appear at the harder levels.
- Enough for everyone. The child gives each friend a cup, a plate or a chair. A friend left waiting makes it plain that there were not enough, and anything left in the pile shows there were extras. Later levels have up to eight friends.
- Sort and count. A mixed pile of fruit, animals or coloured dots goes into bins, and the first level has only two kinds and five things.
- Picture graph. The child builds the graph from the pile, so each column is made of the very pictures being counted. No two columns are the same height, which keeps the question "which is tallest?" honest.
Wrong answers teach. Instead of a plain "try again", each mistake gets a short, specific hint: some are still in the pile, one friend is still waiting, a group was left out, or the pairs are not one to one yet. Children who have reduced motion turned on see items jump straight into place without any animation.
Counting by touch. Nine more games now ask the child to touch each thing once, the way a teacher counts along with a small child. Every tap says and shows its number, and the last number lights up, so "the last number we say tells how many" is something the child sees happen rather than a rule they read. The answer buttons stay hidden until every object has been touched, so nobody can answer a "how many?" question by guessing.
| Game | What the child touches |
|---|---|
| How many? and How many in all? | Each object in a row, a scatter or two clusters, one at a time, then the total |
| Empty basket | Objects that leave the basket one by one, all the way down to none |
| Hidden bag | The objects beside a cloth that already covers some, counting on from the number on its badge |
| Count further and Countdown | Stepping stones, up to thirty or by tens, or down a launch pad to zero |
| Ten frame and Make ten | The empty cells of a ten frame, tapped to build a number or to fill it up to ten |
| Guess and check | A pile counted by touch, to see whether a guess was close |
Building on the frame. On the ten frame, a tap adds a counter and a tap on an added counter takes it back, and a Done button sends the answer. The counters the child adds have their own colour, so "5 and 5 make 10" can be seen on the frame itself. A full frame bounces an extra counter back gently instead of scolding. Numbers from zero to ten can be built, and one level starts with some counters already there and asks how many more are needed.
Guessing before counting. The guessing game now grows in three steps: pick the bigger pile by eye, say "about 5, about 10 or about 20" while a group of five sits beside the pile, then count a pile by touch and decide whether a friend's guess was close (within two). The hints are about comparing to a group you know, never about being wrong.
Wrong answers teach, again. Each wrong number has its own short hint in English and French: the start was already under the cloth, we count by tens, the countdown goes down, nothing is left so the answer is zero, and so on. With reduced motion turned on, numbers appear without any pulsing and the last one is marked with a plain outline.
Putting things in order. Thirteen more games now ask the child to put pictures, numbers or days into places that go one after another. A short row of empty spots sits on the screen with a small tray of cards below it. The child taps a card and then a spot (or drags it), taps a filled spot to take the card back, and presses one Done button. Nothing needs to be read aloud by the child: the cards carry a picture, and the few words on them are spoken by the app.
| Game | What goes where |
|---|---|
| Days in order, Day after, What day was it? | Day cards on a week with school days and weekend days drawn with different shapes; a marker for "tomorrow" or "yesterday" on a week where today wears the sun |
| Yesterday, today, tomorrow | A marker or an event picture on a line that always runs from a night gone, to the sun, to a new sunrise |
| First, next, last | Three or four pictures of a routine, from waking up to a bus ride to planting a seed, twelve routines in all |
| When does it happen? | An activity picture into the sky: sun or moon, then morning, afternoon, evening and night, and two pictures to put in the order of the day |
| What comes next, Fill the gap, Same pattern | Tiles into the empty slot of a pattern, anywhere in it or at the end, and the same pattern built again with different things such as claps, colours or animals |
| Neighbour houses, Number track | The missing number onto a street of houses or a track from 0 to 10, then shuffled number cards put smallest first |
| Which goes in the middle?, Order objects | Things drawn at their real relative size, put in order from small to big or from short to long, and by weight with animals |
Wrong answers teach here too. Each mistake gets its own hint in English and French: the weekend days come together, after Sunday a new week starts with Monday, that house is already on the street, that number is already on the track, the last picture of a story cannot come first, the sun is up so it is not night. When a whole row is back to front, the hint points to the other end. With reduced motion turned on, cards simply appear in their spots.
More range than before. Patterns now come in shapes and in colours alone, with the missing tile anywhere, and the pattern games start with two full rounds so a young child can hear the rhythm. The days games cover the whole week, going forward and back, and the Sunday-to-Monday turn. The routine game has twelve everyday routines instead of six, and the sky game uses sixteen different activities.
Shapes you can touch. Nine games about shapes now use drawn shapes instead of emoji and word buttons, and the child answers by touching. Tap the circle, the rectangles or the corners; count the sides of a big shape one at a time; sort things into Flat and Solid; try a ball and a cube on a ramp; match a twin; fit pieces into holes; build a bigger shape from small squares; and find shapes hiding in a kitchen, a street or a classroom.
| Game | What the child touches |
|---|---|
| Shape hunt, Is it a rectangle? | Drawn shapes in any colour, size and turn; the square and the rectangle, the circle and the oval are told apart |
| Sides or corners?, Count the sides | The sides or corners of one big shape, each counted aloud once; which shape has no corners, or no straight sides |
| Solid or flat?, Roll or stack? | A ball, cube, box, cone and cylinder, tried on a ramp and then sorted into Rolls, Stacks or Both, or Flat and Solid |
| Same shape | A twin on a shelf, then puzzles of three, four and five pieces, with pieces turned at the end |
| Build a bigger shape | Squares dropped into a dotted silhouette to make a rectangle, a long bar, a block, an L or a plus |
| Shapes around us | Everyday things in a room that have a named shape, then the solid shapes: sphere, cube, cylinder, cone and cuboid |
Wrong answers teach. A square tapped for a rectangle is told that a square has four equal sides; a triangle has three corners; a circle has none; a ball rolls away because it has no flat side. A side that was already counted says so instead of counting twice. With reduced motion turned on, the ramp shows the result without moving.
What is still to come. Reading the finished graph aloud ("which has more?") and putting the bins in order from most to fewest are planned for a later update. The remaining preschool games will move to the same hands-on style in the next batches.
Robots, routes and the ball
Four more games moved from "read a sentence and tap a word" to moving things on a small grid, no larger than three by three for the youngest and four by four for older children.
| Game | What the child does |
|---|---|
| Where is the ball? | Hears "put the cat on the box" and taps the spot on the floor. Words climb from on and under, to in and next to, to between, above and below |
| Robot says | Taps an arrow and watches the robot hop to the star: forward or back, then up or down, then two steps in a row |
| Follow the route | Lines up arrow cards and presses Go. Later the child must give directions to the star around a block, and any route that arrives counts |
| Copy the build | Paints the same squares as the model, then rebuilds a model with shaped tiles |
Wrong answers show why. A robot that walks the wrong way ends up farther from the star, and the hint says so. Putting the toy a gap away when "on" was asked, or swapping up and down, each earn their own short explanation. With reduced motion turned on, the robot simply appears at its new square. English and French arrive together.
Longer, heavier, holds more
Five measuring games now share one little stage where the child tests an idea instead of reading about it. Two ropes are lined up end to end, water is poured from one jug into another, a seesaw tips, two snails race for the same time. Then the child picks the answer.
| Game | What the child does |
|---|---|
| Longer or shorter | Slides the objects so their ends line up, then taps the longer one |
| Holds more | Pours one container into the other and sees which overflows |
| Heavy or light | Watches the seesaw tip toward the heavier side |
| How long does it take? | Watches two things run side by side and picks the one that takes longer |
| Measuring tools | Chooses the right tool for the job: a ruler to measure, a scale to weigh, a cup to pour |
Seeing is the explanation. A wrong answer does not just say "try again": the rope visibly sticks out past the other, or the jug visibly spills. With reduced motion turned on, the result simply appears already finished. English and French arrive together.
Five brand-new games
Alongside the rebuilt games, five new ones fill gaps in what young children are expected to learn.
| Game | What the child does |
|---|---|
| Trace the numeral | Learns how a number is written: which way the pencil goes first, how many strokes it takes, and which digit comes first in the teens |
| Corners and curves | Sorts drawn shapes onto a "Has corners" mat or a "Round" mat, including turned shapes and look-alikes |
| Before, now and later | Sees one picture of a routine as "now" and places the others as already happened or still to come |
| Sort into bins | Sorts a mixed pile by kind, then by colour, before any counting |
| Robot moves | Lines up two to four arrow cards, presses Go, and watches the robot hop to the star, around a rock at the hardest level |
Each starts gently and grows over three levels, gives its own short hint for each common mistake, and works in English and French from the start. With reduced motion turned on, the robot simply appears at its new square.
Forty more play-first games for the core preschool skills
The youngest skills now have a real choice of games to play. Twenty-seven core skills, from taking snacks away to telling the morning from the evening, each offer at least two play-first games, and almost all of them offer three, so a child who has had enough of one can try another way into the same idea.
What is new. Feed a mouse a few snacks and see what is left. Thread beads in a pattern, or copy a clap-and-stomp rhythm with two big buttons (no microphone, nothing to record). Sort the laundry, pair up shoes at the shop, and fill a basket that is bigger or smaller than another. Match shapes onto their grey shadows, stack a tower of things that do not roll, and tap the toy that is in, on, under or next to the box. Line up two ribbons at the start to see which is longer, tip a balance, and put a story, a day or the sky in order.
Kind to small hands. Every game can be played by tapping as well as dragging. Targets are large, a wrong try shows the right answer with no penalty, and a hint appears after two misses. Games that show something moving, such as the balance or the size train, simply show the final picture when reduced motion is on. Each one has a replay-sound button and works in English and French from the start.
Two skills, counting and sorting the groups and using maths words in play, still have two games each. A third is planned for each.