PROMOTING EMERGENT MATH SKILLS AND MATH INTEREST IN PRESCHOOL-AGED CHILDREN
OVERVIEW
An intervention was created to promote emergent math skills and math interest in preschool-aged children. The intervention consisted of a set of math activities that could be incorporated into regular classroom routines, such a circle time and meal time. In a random assignment study, Head Start classes were assigned either to incorporate these activities into their daily routine or not to use any of these activities. Children in classes that used the activities improved their math skills significantly, in comparison with students in classes that did not use the activities. Additionally, children in classes that used the activities increased their level of interest in math significantly, as measured by both teacher and student reports.
DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM
Target population: preschool-aged children
This intervention involved incorporating math activities into the regular classroom routine. Teachers were provided with a book of 85 math-relevant activities and used these and other activities to supplement their existing classroom instruction. For three weeks, teachers implemented at least one activity a day during circle time. For another three weeks, teachers implemented two transition and meal time activities, in addition to one small-group activity, each day. Activities used a range of approaches and were designed to target counting, recognizing and writing numbers, one-to-one correspondence, comparison, change operations, and understanding numbers and quantity. Example activities included baking pretzels in the shape of numbers, creating bar graphs, and estimation guessing games.
EVALUATION(S) OF PROGRAM
Evaluated population: 112 children from eight classrooms in two Head Start centers served as the study sample for this investigation. The children ranged in age from three to five and were 40% Puerto Rican, 40% African American, 10% Anglo American, 5% Asian, and 5% biracial.
Approach: All children were individually administered a standardized test of emergent math skills and an assessment of interest in math activities. Teachers also completed measures assessing their students’ level of interest in math and a survey assessing their own level of interest in teaching math.
All classrooms were matched on full- versus half-day status and on morning versus afternoon hours, within centers, and were then randomly assigned to either the treatment group or the control group.
All teachers were trained in the intervention, but only teachers of treatment classes implemented the program. Teacher training was two hours long.
The program ran for six weeks, during which time members of the research team checked in with teachers once a week to address any aspect of the program that was not progressing smoothly.
Upon completion of the intervention, students and teachers were re-assessed on baseline measures.
Results: On the whole, teachers from treatment classrooms were very satisfied with this intervention. They gave the program an overall satisfaction rating of 9.5 out of 10 and described 80% of the math activities as excellent or very good.
Immediately following the intervention, children from treatment classrooms showed significantly more improvement than children from control classrooms on the Test of Early Mathematics Ability (TEMA-2), with an effect size of 1.2 – a substantively large impact. Treatment students were significantly more likely to have learned counting, to be able to identify “more,” and to be able to read and write numbers. Boys in the treatment group improved significantly more than did girls. Additionally, Puerto Rican and African American children from the treatment group improved significantly more than did Anglo American children.
Teachers from treatment classrooms rated their students as significantly more interested in number activities than did teachers from control classrooms. The difference between the control students’ and treatment students’ level of interest in counting activities and math in general was marginally significant. During the intervention, treatment students’ level of interest in sorting activities increased significantly, relative to control students, but their level of interest in playing with number-manipulative toys did not increase significantly.
Treatment children’s reported level of interest in math toys was significantly higher than control children’s reported level of interest at the conclusion of the intervention.
Also at post-test, compared with the control group, teachers in the treatment group reported that they enjoyed teaching math more and that they were more competent at teaching math.
SOURCES FOR MORE INFORMATION
Curriculum materials are unavailable for purchase.
References:
Program categorized in this guide according to the following:
Evaluated participant ages: 3-5
Evaluated participant grades: pre-school
Program age ranges in the guide: early childhood
Program components: early childhood education
Measured outcomes: education & cognitive development
KEYWORDS: Early Childhood (0-5), Children, Preschool, Education, Academic Motivation, Educational Expectations, Academic Achievement, Mathematics, School-based, Hispanic or Latino, Black or African-American, White or Caucasian, Asian.
Program information last updated 7/24/07
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© Child Trends 2003 |
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