Children are making chocolate chip cookies, counting toy fish, raising chickens, making tessellations and drawing icosahedrons.

Wait. Tesselation? Icosahedrons? In a kindergarten?

It’s part of a numeracy program called Let’s Count, promoted as part of National Literacy and Numeracy Week by the Smith Family.

Kindergarten teacher Liz Bandy says mathematics is at the core of our everyday existence, and children from less-privileged backgrounds often lack life skills in being able to use numbers.

“It’s about making maths very visual and in the everyday,” says Ms Bandy.

“Going to the supermarket and choosing what you’re going to buy, counting apples, measuring ingredients for making cookies – it’s in the everyday environment, everywhere, in everything we do.

“The children need to count the eggs before the hatch, then measure the chickens as they grow … it’s all mathematics.”

The Smith Family says families living in disadvantage need greater access to pre-school reading and maths programs so their children can have a stronger start at school.

“There is a common misconception that all children begin their school journey with the same literacy and numeracy skills,” says the Smith Family’s Victorian general manager Anton Leschen.

“However, research shows that 15.4 percent of all children are developmentally vulnerable in language and cognitive skills before they start school. This increases to one-in-four children in our most disadvantaged communities.”

Anita Rowe says her son Dylan finds the exercises promoted by Let’s Count great fun.

“He counts cars on the way to school, or the shops, just to get him used to numbers. He loves numbers,” says Ms Rowe.

“He’ll be sitting at the tea table and all of sudden he’ll be saying ‘99 plus 1 is 100’. And he’s 5.”

For the record, an icosahedron is a polyhedron with 20 faces.