Intuitive and Informal Knowledge in Preschoolers’ Development of Probabilistic Thinking

Abstract

Abstract:Preschoolers develop a wide range of mathematical informal knowledge and intuitive thinking before they enter formal, goal-oriented education. In their everyday activities young children get engaged with situations that enhance them to develop skills, concepts, strategies, representations, attitudes, constructs and operations concerning a wide range of mathematical notions. Recently there is scientific interest in linking children's informal and formal knowledge in order to provide them with opportunities to avoid biases aiming at formulating, perceiving, reflecting on and exercising probabilistic notions. The current study investigates preschoolers' (N=90) intuitive understanding of the likelihood of events in a probabilistic task with spinners. Participants, at the age of 4 to 6, are tested on their predictions of the most probable outcome prior to and after an instructive session of reasoning. The probabilistic task, based on constructivist principles, includes methodological alterations concerning the sample space and the themes of the stimuli. Educational implications are further discussed under the general point of view that in order to link informal to formal mathematical learning in preschool classroom, the subject content and the cognitive capacity of children are important to match.Los niños en edad preescolar desarrollan un conocimiento matemático informal y un pensamiento intuitivo antes de comenzar la educación formal, orientada a la búsqueda de objetivos. En sus actividades cotidianas, los niños pequeños participan en situaciones que promueven el desarrollo de habilidades, percepciones, estrategias, representaciones, actitudes, construcciones y operaciones relacionadas con una amplia gama de conceptos matemáticos. Recientemente existe un interés científico por establecer una relación entre el conocimiento formal e informal de los niños, permitiéndoles así evitar sesgos en la formulación, percepción, razonamiento y/o en el ejercicio de nociones probabilísticas. El presente estudio aborda la comprensión intuitiva de la probabilidad de eventos en niños en edad preescolar (N=90) en un juego probabilístico con discos giratorios. Se examinó la capacidad de los participantes, niños de entre 4 y 6 años de edad, para prever el resultado más probable antes y después de una sesión instructiva de

Risk literacy: Concepts and pedagogical implications for early childhood education

“…Risk-taking is interconnected with aspects of cognitive, social, emotional and biological development (Boyer, 2006). Through diverse contexts and play situations, children have been found able to reason and face feasibilities, estimate odds and therefore make probability judgments, and deal both semantically and conceptually with the evaluation of future events (Nikiforidou et al, 2013). Moreover, children as young as four can understand and rationalize safety and non-safety matters.…”

“…Studies have shown that children as young as four demonstrate an understanding of probabilities and expected value, adjust preferences based on probabilities, indicate notions of probabilistic thinking, and possess specific concepts and skills associated with probabilistic reasoning like causal strength, future reasoning and linguistic capacity connected to risk (e.g. Nikiforidou et al, 2013; Nikiforidou, 2017). Therefore, risk literacy can be connected to probabilistic tasks with dice, cards, and guessing and prediction games in exploring possible future outcomes.…”

El desarrollo de la matemática informal en los niños

“…En sus actividades cotidianas, los niños pequeños participan en situaciones que promueven el desarrollo de habilidades, percepciones, estrategias, representaciones, actitudes, construcciones y operaciones relacionadas con una amplia gama de conceptos matemáticos (Nikiforidou, Pange, & Chadjipadelis, 2013). En esta línea, Ginsburg et al (2008) mencionan que los investigadores en los últimos años han acumulado evidencias que demuestran que, desde el nacimiento hasta los cinco años de edad, los niños desarrollan una matemática cotidiana (incluyendo ideas informales de más y menos, adición, sustracción, forma, tamaño, localización, patrones, posición, etc.)…”

Maybe, maybe not: Probabilistic reasoning in preschool period

“…Intuitions may emerge in both formal and informal contexts, but in the case of early years in terms of time intuitive thinking is mainly associated with informal knowledge. Under this perspective, young children are expected to estimate odds and unpredictability and therefore make probability judgments at a certain level, prior to formal learning (Nikiforidou, Pange & Chadjipadelis, 2013).…”