The mathematical knowledge and understanding young children bring to school

Clarke, Barbara; Cheeseman, Jill; Clarke, Doug

doi:10.1007/bf03217430

Cited by 70 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 17 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Children performing in the lowest 25th percentile in both samples were weaker in all sets of items measuring different mathematical skills compared to the other three higher performance groups. Consistent with earlier research (e.g., Clarke, Clarke, & Cheeseman, 2006), we found that many children already understood much of what is considered in mathematics curriculum and materials in their forthcoming school year in the kindergarten or the first grade.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Early Mathematical Performance in Finnish Kindergarten and Grade One

Mononen

Aunio

2013

LUMAT

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present study assessed Finnish kindergarten (N = 177, Mage = 76.4 months, SD = 3.7 months) and grade one (N = 178, Mage = 87.2 months, SD = 3.7 months) children's mathematical skills in the beginning of the school year. The mathematical skills were assessed once using researcher-developed paper-pencil tests. The variance analysis (ANOVA) was used to study the effects of age and gender on performance level. Boys and girls performed similarly in both samples, but age effects were found in the kindergarten and first grade; older children performed higher than younger ones. The older children may have had more opportunities to practise and get acquainted with mathematical issues, as the age difference between the youngest and the oldest child in the classroom can be up to one year. Children performing at or below the 25th percentile in both samples showed significantly weaker performance in several mathematical skills (i.e., number word sequences, enumeration, and addition and subtraction), compared to other performance groups. On the other hand, many children already understood in the beginning of the school year much of what is considered in mathematics curriculum and materials in their forthcoming school year in the kindergarten or the first grade.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Early Mathematical Performance in Finnish Kindergarten and Grade One

Mononen

Aunio

2013

LUMAT

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In creating the growth points, the project team studied available research on key ''stages'' or ''levels'' in young children's mathematics learning (e.g., Clements et al 1999;Lehrer and Chazan 1998), as well as frameworks developed by other authors and groups to describe learning. Data relating to growth points and student learning have been reported in a number of publications (see, e.g., Clarke 2004;B. A. Clarke, Clarke, and Cheeseman 2006).…”

Section: The Enrpmentioning

confidence: 97%

Building teachers’ expertise in understanding, assessing and developing children’s mathematical thinking: the power of task-based, one-to-one assessment interviews

Clarke

Roche

2011

ZDM Mathematics Education

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this paper, we outline the benefits to teachers' expertise of the use of research-based, one-to-one assessment interviews in mathematics. Drawing upon our research and professional development work with teachers and students in primary and middle years in Australia and the research of others, we argue that the use of the interviews builds teacher expertise through enhancing teachers' knowledge of individual and group understanding of mathematics, and also provides an understanding of typical learning paths in various mathematical domains. The use of such interviews also provides a model for teachers' interactions and discussions with children, building both their pedagogical content knowledge and their subject matter knowledge.

show abstract

“…Recent research has indicated that young children do possess many conceptual resources which, with appropriately designed and implemented learning experiences, can be bootstrapped toward sophisticated forms of reasoning not typically seen in the early grades (e.g., Clarke, Clarke, & Cheesman, 2006;English & Watters, 2005;Lesh & English, 2005;Perry & Dockett, 2008). Most research on early mathematics and science learning has been restricted to an analysis of children's actual developmental level, which has failed to illuminate children's potential for learning under stimulating conditions that challenge their thinking.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Young children’s early modelling with data

English

2010

Math Ed Res J

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

An educational priority of many nations is to enhance mathematical learning in early childhood. One area in need of special attention is that of statistics. This paper argues for a renewed focus on statistical reasoning in the beginning school years, with opportunities for children to engage in data modelling activities. Such modelling involves investigations of meaningful phenomena, deciding what is worthy of attention (identifying complex attributes), and then progressing to organising, structuring, visualising, and representing data. Results reported here are derived from the first year of a three-year longitudinal study in which three classes of first-grade children and their teachers engaged in activities requiring the creation of data models. The theme of "Looking after our Environment," a component of the children's science curriculum at the time, provided the context for the activities. Findings include children's abilities to focus their attention on qualities of items rather than the items themselves in identifying attributes, switch their attention from one item feature to another, and create a broad range of models in organising, structuring, and representing their data. Children's development of meta-representational knowledge facilitated their choice and nature of data representations.

show abstract

The mathematical knowledge and understanding young children bring to school

Cited by 70 publications

References 17 publications

Early Mathematical Performance in Finnish Kindergarten and Grade One

Early Mathematical Performance in Finnish Kindergarten and Grade One

Building teachers’ expertise in understanding, assessing and developing children’s mathematical thinking: the power of task-based, one-to-one assessment interviews

Young children’s early modelling with data

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About