A Shape in its Place
Telling shapes apart
How it plays
Shapes drift around a screen split into patches, one for circles, one for squares, and later triangles and stars as well. Your child drags each shape into its patch.
What it's for
Telling shapes apart. It adapts as your child plays: after a few rounds that go well it steps up a little, and after a couple of hard ones it quietly steps back. The level number only ever goes up. You can also set it up on the first screen: “How fast they wander”, “How many of each”, “Keep them where I put them”.
There is no score to lose and no way to fail. A wrong move is met with a gentle nudge, and a level ends when it's won.
Away from the screen: Shape spotting
About two minutes, with things most homes have.
- Walk round a room or the garden together.
- Find a circle (a plate), a square (a window pane), a triangle (a sandwich cut corner to corner).
- Draw one of each with a finger in the air.
Three questions to ask while they play
- How many corners does this shape have?
- Is this one round, or pointy?
- Where have you seen a shape like this at home?
Play together
Things to say or ask
- How many corners does it have?
- Is that one round, or pointy?
- Can you find a shape like that in the room?
Taking turns on one device: Take turns: one shape each. Say its name before you put it in place.
Talk-about cards: a question a day for a week, for the car or the dinner table. Print them, or read them from your phone.
If they find it hard
On the first screen, turn "How many of each" down, or tick "Keep them where I put them". Or try A Match for the Patch first: finding two that are just the same.
A sheet to print
Print the A Shape in its Place sheet
One A4 page, in black and white or colour.
From two to eight
Tiny Steps: made for two- and three-year-olds too. With Tiny Steps on, it stays on its gentlest level, a not-yet tap is never counted, and there's nothing to read.
Switch Tiny Steps or Big Steps on in Who's playing?, on the grown-ups' page.
What it practises
- Shapes. Naming and sorting circles, squares, triangles and stars.
AC9MFSP01 (Mathematics, Foundation)
The codes are from the Early Years Learning Framework V2.0 (for children from birth to five) and the Australian Curriculum v9 (Foundation to Year 2). Each links to the official wording. Every skill, and the games for it.
What it costs, and what we collect
Nothing, and nothing. There is no account, no advertising and no tracking of any kind. Which games have been played is remembered on your own device and is never sent anywhere. The full version is here, and it's short.
Where it lives
A Shape in its Place lives in The Bright Spot — shapes, colours and noticing. It works on a phone, a tablet or a classroom screen, and once it's been opened it keeps working with no signal at all.
Updated