Young Children's Block Play and Mathematical Learning

Park, Boyoung; Chae, Jeong-Lim; Boyd, Barbara Foulks

doi:10.1080/02568540809594652

Cited by 21 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Compared to the control group, children in the intervention conditions scored higher on the spatial reasoning assessments (e.g., built structures with more three-dimensional features or more successfully copied a two-dimensional image with a set of blocks), thus supporting the idea that specific play behaviors with the blocks can lead to benefits in reasoning abilities. Similar results have been found in children's development of mathematical and engineering concepts through block play (e.g., Kamii, Miyakawa, & Kato, 2004;Park, Chae, & Boyd, 2008;Samara & Clements, 2009;Van Meeteren & Zan, 2010).…”

Section: Object Play and The Exploration Of Physical Science Conceptssupporting

confidence: 69%

Children’s Exploration of Physical Phenomena During Object Play

Solis

Curtis

Hayes-Messinger

2017

Journal of Research in Childhood Education

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Section: Object Play and The Exploration Of Physical Science Conceptssupporting

confidence: 69%

Children’s Exploration of Physical Phenomena During Object Play

Solis

Curtis

Hayes-Messinger

2017

Journal of Research in Childhood Education

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“…The more children know about wooden unit blocks containing a variety of shapes (Hsieh and Mccollum, 2018), the more they can manipulate different shapes, and the more complex their patterns of block building become (Stannard et al, 2001). Our quantitative results are consistent with Park et al (2008) qualitative analysis that found three major actions (i.e., categorizing geometric shapes, composing a larger shape with smaller shapes, and transforming shapes) in free play with wooden unit blocks. The lack of a significant association between 3-D shape naming and block-building complexity was probably due to these young children's poor understanding of the names of 3-D shapes, with a mean of 1.44, suggesting a floor effect.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

Spatial Skills Associated With Block-Building Complexity in Preschoolers

et al. 2020

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Block building is a popular play activity among young children and is also used by psychologists to assess their intelligence. However, little research has attempted to systematically explore the cognitive bases of block-building ability. The current study (N = 66 Chinese preschoolers, 32 boys and 34 girls; mean age = 4.7 years, SD = 0.29, range = 3.4 to 5.2 years) investigated the relationships between six measures of spatial skills (shape naming, shape recognition, shape composition, solid figure naming, cube transformation, and mental rotation, with the former four representing form perception and the latter two representing visualization) and block-building complexity. Correlation results showed that three of the four measures of form perception (shape naming, shape recognition, and shape composition) were significantly and positively correlated with block-building complexity, whereas the two measures of visualization were not. Results from regression models indicated that shape recognition and shape composition, as well as shape-recognition-by-gender interaction, were unique predictors of children's block-building complexity. These findings provide preliminary evidence for the basic spatial skills underlying children's block-building complexity and have implications for classroom instructions aimed at improving preschoolers' block-building complexity.

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“…Many studies highlighting mathematics learning are explorative, in the sense that researchers and teachers study children's understanding, mathematical behaviour and strategies when encountering building blocks or puzzles (van Nes & van Eerde, 2010). Accordingly, there is no doubt about the learning opportunities that lay within, for Early Child Development and Care example, block play (Park, Chae, & Boyd, 2008), stimulating mathematical actions such as categorising, comparison and transformation. A physical environment with rich opportunities to explore and manipulate is further emphasised as a prerequisite for high pedagogical quality (Sheridan, 2009).…”

Section: Manipulatives In Mathematics Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Less is more – mathematical manipulatives in early childhood education

Björklund

2013

Early Child Development and Care

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This article is a discussion drawing on a learning study with a teacher working with one-and two-year-olds. The focal interest is a scrutiny of the use of manipulative objects, emanating from observations of a teacher's and children's use of, and responses to the use of, different objects. The concept of size and the notions 'large' and 'small' are offered as authentic examples and analysed in terms of the variation theory of learning. Main findings are that mathematics learning in early childhood will benefit from a greater attention to how teachers can make use of specific objects for certain pedagogical purposes. Analysis reveals the necessity to pay attention to how the aspects of the learning object can be discerned by the children, given that fewer features offer more learning opportunities. The teacher's role as a guide is, though, considered essential in supporting the children's discerning act through both verbal and visual means.

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Young Children's Block Play and Mathematical Learning

Cited by 21 publications

References 8 publications

Children’s Exploration of Physical Phenomena During Object Play

Children’s Exploration of Physical Phenomena During Object Play

Spatial Skills Associated With Block-Building Complexity in Preschoolers

Less is more – mathematical manipulatives in early childhood education

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