"Cake" fractions

Tonight I asked Westley if he wanted to make a pretend cake. Kids never turn down cake - even if it isn't real :)
I asked him how he wanted to decorate it and he chose to paint it.
So we used a paper plate upside down as the cake that he "frosted"
Will had one too.

When he was done, I asked him if he wanted to eat his cake. He enthusiastically said yes. I asked him if I could have cake too and he said yes, but I said, "but you only have one cake, what can we do? He suggested make another cake - good idea :)
But I was gearing for a different experience. I said we didn't have time to make another cake, but asked if I could share his. He said yes. So he said we could cut his. I talked about how I would cut it in half, and showed him how we had two equal halves and also showed how those two halves when put back together made 1 whole. He understands that.
Then I said, I think Grandma and Will each want a piece of cake too. What can we do? I walked him through how we could each cut our pieces in half and then we would have 4 pieces all the same size. We cut our cake into fourths. We gave 1/4 to Grandma, 1/4 to Will, 1/4 to Westley and 1/4 to me. We all pretended to eat our cake.


In no way do I expect him to truly understand fractions or do I push him to learn math skills of division, but he has an interest in numbers and through casual, playful exposure I think when it is necessary for him to truly know this stuff he might have a little easier time grasping the big concepts.