Measuring Spontaneous Focus on Space in Preschool Children

Children's attention to numerical quantities relates to verbal number knowledge: An introduction to the Build-A-Train task

Which dimension of a set of objects is more salient to young children: number or size? The 'Build-A-Train' task was developed and used to examine whether children spontaneously use a number or physical size approach on an un-cued matching task. In the Build-A-Train task, an experimenter assembles a train using one to five blocks of a particular length and asks the child to build the same train. The child's blocks differ in length from the experimenter's blocks, causing the child to build a train that matches based on either the number of blocks or length of the train, as it is not possible to match on both. One hundred and nineteen children between 2 years 2 months and 6 years 0 months of age (M = 4.05, SD = 0.84) completed the Build-A-Train task, and the Give-a-Number task, a classic task used to assess children's conceptual knowledge of verbal number words. Across train lengths and verbal number knowledge levels, children used a number approach more than a size approach on the Build-A-Train task. However, children were especially likely to use a number approach over a size approach when they knew the verbal number word that corresponded to the quantity of blocks in the train, particularly for quantities smaller than four. Therefore, children's attention to number relates to their knowledge of verbal number words. The Build-A-Train task and findings from the current study set a foundation for future longitudinal research to investigate the causal relationship between children's acquisition of symbolic mathematical concepts and attention to number.

Relations between parent-child interaction and children's engagement and learning at a museum exhibit about electric circuits

Play is critical for children's learning, but there is significant disagreement over whether and how parents should guide children's play. The objective of the current study was to examine how parent-child interaction affected children's engagement and problem-solving behaviors when challenged with similar tasks. Parents and 4- to 7-year-old children in the U.S. (N = 111 dyads) played together at an interactive electric circuit exhibit in a children's museum. We examined how parents and children set and accomplished goals while playing with the exhibit materials. Children then participated in a set of challenges that involved completing increasingly difficult circuits. Children whose parents set goals for their interactions showed less engagement with the challenge task (choosing to attempt fewer challenges), and children whose parents were more active in completing the circuits while families played with the exhibit subsequently completed fewer challenges on their own. We discuss these results in light of broader findings on the role of parent-child interaction in museum settings.