Shorter and Longer: Measurement, Cutting and Sorting Activity

The Shorter and Longer freebie from Kindercraze is one of our early school-year favorites. Incorporating measurement, sorting and cutting, it gives the kiddos hands-on control over how they want to complete the activity.

To start, we provide our kiddos with a stash of precut construction paper strips (about 3/4 in x 4 in long), glue sticks and scissors.

We ask them to select whatever color strips they want and to cut each strip into two unequal pieces and then to sort and glue the pieces on the appropriate sides. They love that they get to pick the colors and number of strips, and they get to cut the strips wherever they want.

We generally don’t have any readers yet at the beginning of the year, so after we give our kiddos the instructions, we also draw a short line under the word “shorter” and a long line under the word “longer” to help them remember which side is which.

This is a great assessment vehicle not just for sorting and comprehension of the measurement concepts of longer and shorter, but also for multi-step direction following.

Let us know what you think of this freebie in the comments!