Preschool Children’s Spontaneous Focusing on Numerosity, Subitizing, and Counting Skills as Predictors of Their Mathematical Performance Seven Years Later at School
This seven-year longitudinal study examined how children’s spontaneous focusing on numerosity (SFON), subitizing based enumeration, and counting skills assessed at five or six years predict their school mathematics achievement at 12 years. The participants were 36 Finnish children without diagnosed neurological disorders. The results, based on partial least squares modeling, demonstrate that SFON and verbal counting skills before school age predict mathematical performance on a standardized test for typical school mathematics in Grade 5. After controlling for nonverbal IQ, only SFON predict school mathematics. Subitizing-based enumeration skills have an indirect effect via number sequence s…
The role of maternal support of competence, autonomy and relatedness in children's interests and mastery orientation
Abstract The present study investigated the extent to which mothers' support for their children's sense of competence, autonomy and relatedness predicts their children's interest in math and reading, and also their mastery orientation, during the transition to primary school. One hundred fifty-two children were examined twice during their first grade year regarding their interests and mastery orientation (Time 1 and Time 2). Mothers filled in a diary and questionnaire measuring maternal support, also on two occasions (Time 1 and Time 2). Children's school performance in reading and math was tested at the beginning of the first grade (Time 1). The results showed that, after controlling for t…
Adaptive Number Knowledge in Secondary School Students: Profiles and Antecedents
Cited By :1 Export Date: 10 February 2021 Correspondence Address: McMullen, J.; Department of Teacher EducationFinland; email: jake.mcmullen@utu.fi The present study aims to examine inter-individual differences in adaptive number knowledge in secondary school students. Adaptive number knowledge is defined as a well-connected network of knowledge of numerical characteristics and arithmetic relations. Substantial and relevant qualitative differences in the strategies and expression of adaptive number knowledge have been found in primary school students still in the process of learning arithmetic. We present a study involving 879 seventh-grade students that examines the structure of individual…
Development of Counting Skills: Role of Spontaneous Focusing on Numerosity and Subitizing-Based Enumeration
Children differ in how much they spontaneously pay attention to quantitative aspects of their natural environment. We studied how this spontaneous tendency to focus on numerosity (SFON) is related to subitizing-based enumeration and verbal and object counting skills. In this exploratory study, children were tested individually at the age of 4–5 years on these skills. Results showed 2 primary relationships in children's number skills development. Performance in a number sequence production task, which is closely related to ordinal number sequence without reference to cardinality, is directly associated with SFON. Second, the association of SFON and object counting skills, which require relat…