Shapes and their parts

I can name the shape an object leaves behind.

A flat shape is not the object. It is what the object's face prints, and naming it means looking at the mark.

The child holds up an object, puts a finger on the mark it made, and says the object first and the shape second.

First lesson. Hold up a jar and ask what shape it is. Take the answers — round, a cylinder, a circle — and say that today the jar will leave its answer on the paper.

This book prints its shapes rather than drawing them: a washed jelly jar dipped in red paint leaves a perfect red circle, and a yellow block leaves the rectangle Seth wanted.

Children press the mouth of a washed jar into shallow paint, stamp it once, and run one finger all the way round the mark without lifting it while saying the shape name; then they stamp a flat face of a block and a triangle box lid beside it and count the straight edges of each new mark by touch.

Marks from three objects, each stamped twice, cut apart and sorted under the four name cards.

Each child holds up one object with a finger on the mark it made and tells a partner the object first and the shape second, and the partner says whether the finger is on the right mark.

I can count the sides and the corners of a shape and write both numbers.

A shape carries two counts, and they are written in a fixed order: sides first, corners second. The shape with nothing to count still gets a number.

The child writes both counts into each row card in the book's order and puts a number in both columns of the circle's row rather than leaving them blank.

Yesterday the marks got names. Today they get numbers, and the numbers go in a row.

The chart at the back gives each shape a row, and each row carries two counts in the same order, sides first and corners second, down to zero and zero for the circle.

Children put a pencil dot on every corner of a print and a small tick on every side, count the ticks aloud and then the dots, and write both counts into that shape's row card — with a partner counting the dots back before anything else is written.

Four row cards, each carrying two counts, with the circle's row filled in rather than blank.

Children lay their row cards in a column, hear the book's four rows read out, and put the square's row beside the rectangle's to say whether the numbers alone would let anybody tell which print was which.

I can build a shape that has the right number of sides and corners.

The book's closing pages state each shape as a checklist. If the list is what makes the shape, a shape built to the list has to pass a count.

The child builds a shape and counts both its sides and its corners against the list the book states for it.

Counting the parts of a shape somebody else printed is one thing. Today the class makes the shape and the parts have to come out right.

The closing pages drop the rhyme and state each shape as a short list of things it must have: three sides and three corners, four equal sides, or perfectly round with no corners at all.

Children say a shape's checklist back before anything is built, then lay three craft sticks so every stick touches two others end to end with no gap, count the sticks and the meeting places, and say whether both numbers match the list.

Four built shapes — triangle, square, rectangle, circle — each counted against its own list.

Children bend a pipe cleaner until its two ends meet with no bend sharper than any other, run a finger round hunting for a corner to stop at, and say what their count of corners came to.

I can sort shapes by whether they have corners, and say my rule.

A tile's group is settled by something checkable, not by what it looks like at a glance. A rule said precisely enough can be applied by somebody who never handled the tile.

A partner places an unsorted tile correctly from the child's spoken rule alone.

Shapes have been built and counted. Today they get sorted, and the rule has to be sayable.

The book states the same fact twice at its close, once for the circle and once for the oval: it has no corners.

Children run one finger slowly round a tile's outside edge without lifting it, put a counter down for every sharp turn, then sort the whole mixed set into the tiles where the finger had to stop and those where it never did — not by colour and not by size.

Two piles sorted by corners, and a rule said in one sentence that a partner has applied to a tile the sorter never handled.

Children sort the long thin oval and the very small triangle by their own rule, say which pile each goes in using the word corner, and say whether the size of a tile changed which pile it belonged in.

I can tell a square from a rectangle by comparing its sides.

Counting leaves the two four-sided shapes indistinguishable. The name comes from a comparison — whether all four sides end together — and that is something the child does, not something the picture says.

The child names each built shape with the reason in the same breath, and sorts an unlabelled set by laying sides against each other.

Yesterday's sort had one clean yes-or-no. Today counting gives the same answer for two different shapes, and something else has to decide.

The book states both four-sided shapes in almost the same words, four sides and four corners each, and then supplies the one thing that separates them.

Children count the sides and corners of a square tile and a rectangle tile, say whether counting alone told them which was which, then build a four-stick shape and a two-long-two-short shape and lay one side on another to see whether all four end together.

Two built four-sided shapes, each named with its reason, and a partner's check made by laying the sides together themselves.

Children sort a set of unlabelled four-sided tiles into a square pile and a rectangle pile by laying sides against each other, and say aloud for at least two of them what they did to decide.

I can say whether two marks are the same size and the same shape, and which half fails.

Congruent is two claims in one word. A big jar and a little jar pass one of them and fail the other, so a no has to say which.

The child judges the jar pair not congruent and names the half it failed on before saying anything else about it.

Names have come from counts and from comparisons. Today two shapes get compared with each other, and there are two things to check.

Seth wants the block Dana is using and finds a plastic dollhouse whose bottom is the same size and shape as the block, and the chart at the back says congruent means same size and same shape.

Children stamp the block's face and the house's bottom, cut one mark out and lay it on the other, sliding and turning it until it sits as well as it can, and say whether the edges finish together all the way round.

Two judged pairs — the block and house, and the big jar and the little jar — with both halves of the reason said aloud for each.

Children take both pairs of marks to another pair, say for each whether the marks are congruent with a finger on each mark, and name the failing half first where a pair fails.

I can sort containers by shape and say which words are about height instead.

English uses tall for a thing and for a place, and the two get mixed. A finger round a rim settles the shape words; standing two builds on one table settles the height words.

The child says which two of the four words are about the outline of a thing and which two are about how high it sits, and sorts six containers by touch before looking.

Flat shapes have been printed, counted, built and compared. Today the shapes are containers, and two of the words in play are not about shape at all.

Tom asks the four words out loud and the book never answers him, which makes them a set worth handling rather than a list to recite.

With eyes closed, children take a container from the feely bag, run a finger all the way round its rim without lifting, and say curvy if the finger never stops and square if it turns a corner, then open their eyes to check and put it on the right side of the mat.

Six containers sorted by touch and checked by sight, and two builds — a tower and a low bed — compared by standing them on one table top.

Children take the four kitten cards and the rooms the class has built and say for each kitten which room suits it, naming the kitten, naming the word and giving a reason; a partner may disagree and name a different word, and both say why.