After the Sandpaper Numbers, it’s time to show the correlation between the written number and what it represents.  I had the perfect number of mini rubber duckies for this work, so I designed my cards using the ducks.

I made a card for 1, 2, and 3.  Below the numbers, I put yellow stickers down to show where L should place the ducks.  Montessori math works have a particular way of doing this — the dot representing 1 always goes in the upper left corner (not in the center of the card).  For 2, you place two dots side by side.  For 3, it’s two dots side by side and then one on the left side below the first two.  It continues in this fashion for all the numbers.  It’s done this way to show the even/odd and more/less.

To show L this work, I first laid out the cards and traced the numbers like we did for the Sandpaper Numbers.  I traced 1, said “This says one.”  Then I touched the yellow dot, and said, “This is one.”  We did the same for 2 and 3.  The mini rubber duckies made this work extra fun for L (you can find them here), but really you can use any objects.