Early years distance and length

Barrier games build on children's natural desire to combine block play with small world items.

As children move around an obstacle course, adults can model positional language, encourage children to describe their movement themselves and create their own course.

In this activity, children are encouraged to follow familiar and new routes, and to create their own maps.

Children use everyday language to talk about size, to compare quantities and objects and to solve problems

Using the spring scale in this activity provides an engaging context in which children can explore and discuss the weight of different objects.

By making 'caterpillars' in this activity, children will have an opportunity to practise using language of length and width, as well as using non-standard measures to compare lengths.