Ordinal Numbers from Either End: Start at the Flag

Seven vehicles stand in each of the three lines on this Kindergarten page — a submarine, an ambulance, a forklift, a train and more on the sheet shown — under an arrow with a flag at one end. On two lines the flag is at the left and the arrow runs right; on the third the flag is at the right and the arrow runs left. Two chips under each line give a place and a mark — 5th with a circle, 7th with a cross; 3rd with a circle, 6th with a cross — and the child must find the flag first, count from that end, and make the mark on the vehicle in that place.

Everything on this page is the base find-the-place page except the one thing that matters: the starting end is no longer fixed. That is the real definition of an ordinal — 3rd from where — and a child who counts from the left out of habit will mark the wrong vehicle on the reversed line. The page always carries at least one line in each direction, so the habit is tested every time. The teacher's prompt is the title itself: where is the flag? Say it before the child counts, on every strip.

It prints on one sheet, pencil only. This is the either-end face of the ordinal-numbers family and the natural second page after the base, at the same Kindergarten level and with the same circle-and-cross chips. The vehicles are the wave's theme. When the reversed line is secure, the 1st grade pages move on to writing and reading the ordinal itself.