Classification flashcards: what category do objects belong to?

Classifying is a critical foundational skill that children need to master for future learning. At a young age, our brains begin to sort, organize and connect new information to previous experiences. That’s why children only a few months old can already distinguish between familiar and unfamiliar people.

When can I start teaching classification to children?

Infants and toddlers can first learn to classify objects by color, size, or shape. a study conducted at the University of Berkley shows that toddlers who worked extensively on categorization learned more vocabulary and had more advanced language.

In kindergarten, children can sort by common categories like animals, clothing, fruits, vegetables, sports, transportation, plants, jewelry, letters, and numbers.

In elementary school, we can introduce new categories like insects, mammals, planets, kitchen appliances, emotions, reptiles, flowers, trees.

Research shows that children can create a category in their minds from two objects only. They can then add other items to the category by building on those two initial objects. for example, when we explain to children that cats and dogs are animals, this is enough for them to build a category named “animals”. Later when we explain that lions are also animals, it’s easy for children to classify new items in the Animal category.

What skills does classification develop or why learn classification?

Classification is an important skill for building language, learning vocabulary and developping logic and reasoning.

In school , classification is necessary for math (counting for example), science, reading and every other subject. It is so critical that it’s one of the first skills that we teach in preschool.

How to teach classification to children ?

We first teach classification by sorting (see beginner and advanced level sorting by category). Then, we work on classification questions like :

To what category does an item belong (see the file below)
What are some exempls of items included in the category
What are some exempls of items that don’t belong to the category

Classification flashcards are a fun activity to practice categorizing objects after students have mastered sorting by category.

How to learn classification using flashcards?

The student learns to answer the question “what category in an object in?” or “what category does an object belong to?” through 96 flashcards or task cards :

48 flashcards provide three response options to help the child answer the question. Example: “What category is a cat in; shoes, animals, or food?”
48 flashcards that don’t provide any guidance for the answer, the child is expected to answer without any help. Example: “What category is pizza in?”

As an answer, the child is expected to name the category that an object belongs to.

This task card set includes 96 questions about 96 different objects. Here are examples of the questions included in this activity :

What category is a cat in?
What category is a doll in?
What category is an oven in?
What category is a whale in?
What category is a laptop in?
What category are sandals in?
What category is a cooking pan in?

In order to introduce this exercise, you can follow these steps:

Print and laminate the activity file (at the bottom of this page), then cut the different boards or task cards,

To get durable materials, use a laminating machine to laminate the pdf file and storage envelopes to store the flashcards.

Ask the question on the task card and let the child answer by either naming the category. There are two types of flashcards included in the activity :
- Flashcards with three response options
- Flashcards without response option.