Ask families to draw a picture, do a painting or make a collage of their family or perhaps decorate a frame for a family photo.

Ways to develop numeracy through play

• Ask children to count how many people are in their family.
• Talk about sizes – who is the tallest/shortest person in your family?
• Talk about ages – how old are the people in your family? Who is the oldest/youngest?
• Group family members into uncles/aunts/cousins, children/adults.
• Plot on a map where each family lives/comes from.

Ways to develop literacy through play

• Ask children to tell you who is in their family.
• Use nouns such as relatives, cousins, grandparents, sister and brother.
• Read books about families eg Titch by Pat Hutchins, Love makes a Family by Sophie Beer.
• If drawing or collaging a family picture, talk about the different attributes (hair, eye colour etc) of the people in your family.
• Ask families questions like:
  • What do the members of your family do? Do they go to school, university, work?
  • Do they all live in Australia?
  • Do they speak the same languages?
  • Talk about names for people indifferent languages eg Oma/Opa (grandparents in German).

• Use a cardboard house shape or people shapes to create a collage on.
• Plot on a map which country each family comes from, this may also be different regions within South Australia/Australia.
• Make a family tree.
• Make paper doll chains.
• Dramatic family play using:
  • dolls house and families
  • blocks and people
  • home corner.
• Stamping with people shapes.
• Make some people biscuits using gingerbread man cutters.
• Read Goldilocks and the Three Bears – talk about Mumma bear, Papa bear and baby bear (this story also has lots of numeracy opportunities to talk about numbers and sizes).
• Make a belonging tree with photos of all the playgroup families.
• Make a photo book of people in your family.
• What are the interests/likes/dislikes of people in your family?

Parents or carers can:

• Comment on what their children are doing (say what you see).
• Talk in their home language.
• Use literacy and numeracy words (see words to use section above).
• Read books about families to their child.
• Look at photos of their family and talk about where they were taken/what they were doing.

You can help families by:

• Modelling what you want them to do.
• Talking to them about the focus of the activity and what children might be learning.
• Writing up words that go with the activity.
• Making suggestions on what families can do at home.

Great Start activities are for parents and carers to do with their children.

• Making a family cookbook
• Eating together