One type of activity that can be used to teach ordinal numbers is racing. The concept can be incorporated into many physical education and recreational activities, as long as the competition does not disrupt the classroom. If the students are interested in competitive sports teams outside the classroom, the class can keep track of rankings in baseball, football, or basketball conferences. The entire class can keep track of teams in a single conference, or small groups can focus on individual teams or separate conferences.
Ordinal numbers can be used any time the students need to line up or do anything by turn. Once the students are in line, the teacher can ask: “Who is first? Who is second?…” and so on. The advantages of this activity are that it can easily go past the first ten ordinal numbers, and that it physically involves the student in the action. There are several opportunities to practice this type of activity during the school day. Students can also do this sort of activity with objects such as counting blocks or toy animals.
Many books and songs written for young children incorporate ordinal numbers into their story. The ordinal aspects of songs and stories can be made more meaningful by having the students act out parts of the action. Songs can provide repetitive practice in ordinal numbers without boring the student, The teacher can also start discussions with the class about the order of the characters in the song or story.
Sequencing involves taking a series of pictures or sentences and setting them in the correct order to tell a meaningful story. The teacher can make this both a math activity and a language arts activity, by having the students discuss the action and the order in which it is taking place. This is an activity that can be done individually, in small groups, or with the entire classroom. The student can also do the work independently, which is not always possible with some of the other activities mentioned.