Sorting by category for Beginners

Why learn about categories

Sorting by categories is the act of organizing objects into different groups that have similar attributes. Understanding categories of objects can be challenging for children in preschool or speech therapy. Categories are the foundation of learning, creating relationships, storing, and recalling words. Sorting by category is an important skill to acquire by children because :

it helps retain and understand new vocabulary by linking it to a category,
it helps develop conversation skills

How to teach categories in preschool or speech therapy

There are many ways to teach categories:

Sort 2 or more items that go together and discuss why. Sorting is usually the easiest teaching method to start learning categories
Name the category: example “A dog, a cat, and a fox are animals“
List objects in a category: example “Name 3 fruits”
Find the item that doesn’t belong with others in the same category

How to teach categories using ABA

Applied Behavior Analysis ABA provides an intuitive and easy way to learn about categories. In ABA, learning is divided into small and easy steps to make the learning process is very simple:

Level 1: we start with easy sorting activities/task cards where the child has to classify items :
- only 2 categories, like Shoes and Vegetables,
- and 2 objects for each ( sneakers and sandals are shoes, onions and peppers are vegetables)

Level 2: here the child sorts more items (up to 5) for 2 categories, from those he learned in the previous level. This enables the child to generalize what he learned and understand the categories of objects around him.

What are some examples of categories of objects?

In this activity, we chose 28 categories of objects that children use daily: transportation, animals, clothing, cookware, bags, birds, toys, fruits, buildings, insects, veggies, trees, furniture, flowers, school supplies, tools, home appliances, drinks, cleaning tools, sports, jewelry, planets, computers, meat, fish, shoes, and fast food.

For each one of these categories, the child answers the question: “sort objects that belong to the same category ”

How to use this class sorting activity

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

Print and laminate the activity file (at the bottom of this page), then cut the different images,
Use a velcro
- to attach the images to the activity card when the child answers.
- and use another velcro on the back of each activity card for organization and to make it easy to start and put away the activity.

The task cards provide a sample from each category to make it easy for the child to understand what is expected from him.
Ask the child to: “put the objects that belong to the same category together“.
Then the child does the same for the other cards on level 1.
When the child masters level 1 task cards: he is capable of sorting by class quickly, without errors, and without help, He can move to level 2 task cards. At this point, the child is capable of sorting more objects (up to 5) belonging to the same category.

Download the printable file