Numbers and shapes
Kindergarten mathematics in Alberta is small and deep: quantities up to 10, shapes you can find in the room, comparisons made by putting two things side by side, and events put in order. No symbols are required.
What Alberta asks for by the end of Kindergarten
The subject: Mathematics
- Count and show how many, within 10.
- Spot 2‑D and 3‑D shapes in the world around them.
- Compare two objects by length, area, weight and how much they hold.
- Put a sequence of events in time order.
Notice what is not there: no addition or subtraction symbols, no numbers past 10, no rulers. Alberta asks for a small range understood properly, and everything in Grade 1 is built on it.
The words, first
These are the terms a teacher will use at a parent interview, defined before anything below uses them.
| Word | What it means |
|---|---|
| Counting | Saying the number words in order. A child can do this perfectly and still not know how many things are on the table. |
| One-to-one correspondence | One number word per object, no object counted twice, none skipped. This is the part that has to be pointed and touched. |
| Cardinality | Knowing that the last number you said is the answer. Ask “so how many?” — if they recount from one, cardinality has not clicked yet. |
| Subitizing | Seeing a small amount without counting. Three dots on a die are three at a glance. It is what makes later arithmetic quick. |
| 2-D shape | A flat shape — circle, square, triangle, rectangle. It lives on paper. |
| 3-D shape | A solid you can hold — a ball is a sphere, a box is a cube, a tin is a cylinder, a party hat is a cone. |
| Attribute | Something about an object you can compare: how long, how heavy, how much it holds, how much space it covers. |
| Direct comparison | Comparing by lining two things up rather than measuring. Which pencil is longer? Put them end to end and look. |
“So how many?”
Five.
What to do at home
- Touch every one — Count stairs, forks, grapes — but touch each one as you say its number. Counting in the air is where the skipping happens.
- Ask “so how many?” — After they count, ask again. If they start over from one, that is the thing to practise this month.
- Dice and dominoes — Any game where you glance at a pattern and know it is four builds subitizing for free.
- Shape-name the room — “The tin is a cylinder.” “The window is a rectangle.” Alberta asks for shapes in the environment, not on a worksheet.
- Line it up — Which spoon is longer? Which bag is heavier? Which cup holds more? Let them pour and find out — being wrong out loud is the useful part.
- Tell the day back — First we ate, then we walked, then we read. Order in time is on the Kindergarten list, and bedtime is the natural place for it.
Sheets you can print for this
- Count and circle — up to 5
- Count and write — up to 10
- Trace the numbers — 1 to 10
- Flat shapes and solid shapes — 2-d and 3-d
- What comes next? — repeating patterns
- Which one? — longer, heavier, holds more
The expectations above are paraphrased from Alberta Education's New K–6 curriculum fact sheets, which publish a snapshot of each grade rather than the complete program of studies. Alberta's full programs are at alberta.ca/curriculum.