EYFS shapes activities – 10-lesson summer term planning

What's included?

Lesson plans, PowerPoint presentations, worksheets

Key Stage

Early Years

Age

Year R

Subjects

Teach Reception children about manipulating, composing and decomposing shapes with this ten-lesson resource full of EYFS shapes activities.

Lesson aims

Week 1

Select shapes that are suitable for a particular purpose
Rotate shapes to fit and create models and pictures
Manipulate shapes to develop spatial reasoning skills
Use informal language and analogies to describe arrangements of shapes
Select, rotate and manipulate shapes

Week 2

Compose a shape and recognise that a shape has other shapes within it
Decompose a shape and recognise that a shape has other shapes within it
Select, rotate and manipulate shapes
Recognise that a shape can have other shapes within it, just as numbers can

Key questions

Week 1

What shape do you need now?
Which shape do you need next?
Why have you used this shape?
What is this shape?
Is this the same shape?
How can you make that shape fit?
What will fit in there?
What shape fits?

Week 2

What shape are you making?
What can you split this shape into?
What shape will you make when you fold it in half?
What new shapes have you made?
What is the picture?
What is missing?
What shape can you see?
What is the same about these shapes?
What shapes can you split it into?
What do you need to do so it fits?

EYFS shapes activities for first lesson

Start by recapping and checking retrieval of 2D and 3D shapes, their names and their properties. Explain that you want to build a model train using 3D shapes (these could be shape models or cardboard boxes, cylinders etc).

Start with the engine at the front of the train and ask children to help you select the best shapes for different parts of the model. Discuss why one shape is a better choice than another.

Look at the pizza outline worksheet and explore how 2D shapes can be selected to represent different toppings.

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