Teaching Numbers with Apple as the Prop

Counting Lesson in Sanggar Fortune Nursery School with Ayunda

“Let’s say it together, what is this number?” said the Junior Brand Consultant of Verbrand team of Fortune PR, Ayunda Eka Pratama, loudly. About ten children sitting cross-legged in front of her immediately responded in chorus, “Zero!” And they all laughed and clapped happily after getting praises from Ayunda.

Yeah, Ayunda chose a different way to start her day that morning. Before starting the hectic office activities with a stack of projects and meeting schedules with clients, Ayunda decided to become a guest teacher in Sanggar Fortune Nursery School. That morning, on September 26, 2013, Ayunda and the Corporate Communications team of FORU visited FORU’s third nursery school in Lenteng Agung to teach them counting. So exciting!

By using mini sticks with pictures of apples as the props, Ayunda taught the children aged 4-6 years simple calculations. “I have three apples. If I get two more apples, how many apples do I have?” Ayunda asked while showing the props. “Let’s count together, ok.. One, two, three, four, five.. So, three plus two equals five!” Ayunda explained.

Besides addition, Ayunda also helped the kids to understand subtraction. “If I have four apples and I take two apples away, how many apples are there?” asked Ayunda, and together the children answered right away, “Two!” After the counting activities, Ayunda, who was accompanied by Herdinda Arizunnisa from Corporate Communications team, distributed papers with various pictures of numbers for the children to take home and color.

“It was nice to get a chance to see the kids. Once I have ever taught children, so I am somewhat trained to attract their attention. This class was a success and it makes me miss the kids’ world. Unfortunately, I cannot be a guest teacher here every month because I have to take turns with other Fortuners. Hehehe,” said Ayunda happily when accompanying the children to eat their breakfast.

The Head of Lenteng Agung Nursery School, Sum Purwaningsih, was equally excited. “Since yesterday, we already have had a plan to teach the kids counting. But we did not have any props, so we planned to use only the fingers. Fortunately, FORU team welcomed our good intention and even perfected it through props that were proven to successfully attract their attention, “Sum said. “Yesterday, we just taught them how to write their names on the board, this morning we tried to introduce them to various flavors of food, in the future, we plan to teach the kids how to stick sheep and how to pray to welcome the Eid al-Adha,” she said.