‘Tis the season for holiday cheer and tons of festive fun, including one of my most favorite themes… gingerbread! What pairs perfectly with gingerbread? Why, gumdrops of course! This free Gumdrop Pattern Printable is a hands-on way to learn about patterns with your preschoolers, kindergarteners, or first graders. It’s a fun, easy prep activity to add to your small groups or themed math centers this holiday season!
*Pair with our Gingerbread Centers and Activities for Pre-K & Kindergarten!
Gumdrop Pattern Printable
We work on a variety of patterns in Kindergarten, typically starting with AB patterns like red, green, red, green. This gumdrop pattern activity is especially great in that you can work on ANY pattern you choose, whether it be AB, ABC, ABB, or AAB – just to name the most common for early learners!
How to Prep
If you are wanting to play this more than once or use it as a math center, I would recommend laminating the printable and providing dry erase markers for the coloring. The students can color their own invented patterns, or use manipulatives like counting bears or unifix cubes to build patterns in the rectangle.
I have been feeling extra festive so I gave each student their own small cup of REAL gumdrops to play. After we completed the activity they were able to take their own gumdrops home to eat.
RELATED RESOURCE: Word Problems for Kindergarten – December Edition
How to Play
To play, we first built a pattern in the rectangle to get hands-on, visual practice with a specific pattern. In my small group, I kicked it off by calling out a pattern. “Can you show me an AB pattern with your gumdrops?”
After the pattern was built, it was time to color the first row of gumdrops to represent it. Then, we cleared the rectangle and built a new pattern.
After a few teacher-led rounds the kids were excited to take turns providing the pattern for the group to complete.
This simple and engaging pattern printable was a hit in my class and I just know your students will love it too!
Grab Your FREE Copy
Ready to build some fun gumdrop patterns of your own? Get your free copy of the Gumdrop Pattern Printable by clicking the large, yellow download button at the end of the post!
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So beautiful and fun! Thanks for sharing!