Home Math Literacy Environment, Mathematics Ability, and Disposition toward Mathematics of Young Children

ePapyrus PDF Document International Journal of Early Childhood Education 2012, Vol 18 No 2, 131 145 | 131 | Home Math Literacy Environment, Mathematics Ability, and Disposition toward Mathematics of Y.This study investigated the relations of young children’s math literacy experiences at home, their disposition toward mathematics, and math ability. Fourhundred eighty mothers of 3 to 6 yearold children completed questionnaires about their home math literacy environment and ninetynine children were assessed on their disposition toward mathematics and mathematics ability. Results showed that differences in home math literacy environment were associated with child’s age, mother’s educational level, and regular math class attendance. The child’s disposition toward math was positively associated with the home math literacy environment, but not math ability. These findings suggest that disposition toward math may be related to play materials space and math play－like games while math ability may be

Home Math Literacy Environment, Mathematics Ability, and Disposition toward Mathematics of Young Children

1) Haekyung Hong

Chonnam National University, Korea

Abstract

This study investigated the relations of young children’s math literacy experiences

at home, their disposition toward mathematics, and math ability Four-hundred eighty mothers of 3- to 6- year-old children completed questionnaires about their home math literacy environment and ninety-nine children were assessed on their disposition toward mathematics and mathematics ability Results showed that differences in home math literacy environment were associated with child’s age, mother’s educational level, and regular math class attendance The child’s disposition toward math was positively asso-ciated with the home math literacy environment, but not math ability These findings suggest that disposition toward math may be related to play materials & space and math play－like games while math ability may be related to parental involvement and supports rather than math learning activities

[Key Words] home math literacy environment, mathematics ability, disposition toward

mathe-matics, preschoolers

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent to Haekyung Hong, Department of Early Childhood Education, College of Education, Chonnam National University, Gwang-ju, 500-757, KOREA E-mail: hkhong@jnu.ac.kr

Recently, many researchers and educators have focused on early childhood mathematics education for several reasons First, high-technology and information society requires workers with a high-level of mathematical literacy Cognitive developmental and educational research over the past thirty years shows that young children are more competent and capable of math learning than Piaget’s theorists might perceive There

is growing consensus that math competence in early childhood is a more powerful predictor to later school achievement than literacy ability is Many researchers reported that the differences of mathematical competence in early years had a significant effect

on later math achievement in elementary school (Fielding, 2006; Princiotta, Flanagan,

& Hausken, 2006) Several longitudinal studies show mathematics knowledge and skills

at kindergarten were associated with their fifth-grade mathematics achievement scores (Melhuish, Phan, Sylva, Sammons, Siraj-Blatchford, & Taggart, 2008; Princiotta, Flanagan,

& Hausken, 2006) and many mathematics difficulties in elementary school can be traced

to weakness in early childhood Therefore, how young children acquire their mathematics knowledge and skills in early childhood is a major concern to researchers and educators Young children are born as active thinkers consistently trying to make sense of their world They construct their knowledge through interaction with their physical and social environment from birth Even Geist (2009) said “children are born mathematicians.” Young children have many opportunities to learn about mathematics in the context of everyday activities They construct an informal knowledge of mathematics in their everyday experiences (Ginsburg, Klein, & Starkey, 1998) Their early mathematical experiences play an enormous role in the development of their understanding of mathematics Young children enter preschool or kindergarten with different amounts of mathematics knowledge acquired through their daily experiences Recently, the view of

‘everyday mathematics’ or ‘emergent mathematics’ has been widely accepted One possible source of variation in children’s mathematical abilities may be the physical and social supports of early numbers skills children receive at home The daily experiences of young children are closely related to their home math literacy environment First of all, parenting practice, such as helping children with specific skills, using complex language, responsiveness, and warmth interactions, is associated with better developmental outcomes (Bradley, 2002)

In addition, home learning environment factors, such as the availability of educational resources, attitude toward math of parents, and mathematical activities with children, can play a vital role in determining how well young children will do in math (Sousa, 2008)

However, there is little research on the amount and type of math experiences young children have at home A few studies on home learning environment have been conducted

in the field of early childhood math education but the reports are contradictive Children who did better in math were from families with high scores on the home environment, while quality of the home environment independently predicted math score of young children (Campbell, 1996) Middle-class parents reported providing more mathematics activities to their children than did working-class parents (Starkey & Klein, 2000) However, other research reported that children of different socioeconomic groups and race have had no significant differences in mathematical experiences (Ginsburg, Klein, & Starkey, 1998; Tudge & Doucet, 2004), even though maternal education is a powerful predictor of math achievement (Downer & Pianta, 2006) While other family factors, such

as parent’s education and SES are also important, the extent of home learning activities exerts a greater and independent influence on educational attainment (Melhuish, Phan, Sylva, Sammons, Siraj-Blatchford, & Taggart, 2008)

Such evidence suggests that the extent to which children are involved in mathematical experiences may be different depending on variables For example, the home learning environment’s effects size on the achievement of age five were larger than that of age seven (Melhuish, et al., 2008) Korean parents of 4-year-old children felt more pressure

to hurry to teach Korean characters and bought more picture books for literacy learning than parents of younger or older children (Jean, 2005) From these studies, it may indicate the differences in providing home math literacy environment according to children’s ages Therefore, which variable makes a difference in home math literacy environment needs

to be explored Furthermore, the type and amount of mathematical experiences that Korean parents provide may be different from those that parents in Western countries

do as seen in the report that 78% of kindergarteners attended regular math class after school in Korea (Han, 2007) The primary goal of this study was to investigate the differences in home math literacy environment according to mothers’ educational level, children’s ages, and regular math class attendance

On the other hand, relations between math experiences and math achievement were reported (Campbell, 1996; Skwarchuk, 2009) But there is a lack of research which deals with the relations between home math literacy environment and disposition toward math

of young children, as well as math ability The reports from the studies on early literacy that affective quality of reading interaction was a powerful predictor of children’s motivation for reading (Farver, Xu, Eppe, & Lonigan, 2006; Kwon, 2011; Park, 2011; Sonnenschein & Munstyerman, 2002) imply a possible relation between home math literacy environment and disposition toward math of young children The second goal

of this study was to explore the relations between home math literacy environment and either disposition toward math of young children or mathematics ability of young children

METHOD

To understand the differences in home math literacy environment of young children and the relations of their disposition toward mathematics and math ability, two research questions were addressed in the present research: “Are there differences in home math literacy environments according to mothers’ educational level, age of children, and attendance of regular private math class?” and “Are there correlations between a children’s home math literacy environment and either mathematic ability or disposition toward mathematics?”

Participants

To address the first question, 480 mothers of young children aged between three and six from the Gwangju and Jeollanam-do areas completed questionnaires about their child’s home math literacy environment In the mother sample, 58.3% of the mothers ranged in age from thirty to thirty-five and 30.6% ranged from thirty-six to forty; 22.3%

of mothers graduated from high school, 35.4% of them attended a 2-year college, and 42.3% attended a 4-year college 16.9% of their children were 3-year-olds, 35.8% were 4-year-olds, 31.3% were 5-year-olds, and 16% were 6-year-olds 56.0% of mothers were not working and 32.9% of them were working full time; 46.3% of their children attended regular private math classes

To address the second question, ninety-nine preschoolers aged between four and six from kindergartens in Gwangju were assessed on their disposition towards mathematics and mathematic ability In the children sample, 58.6% of the children were boys and 41.4% of them were girls, 22.2% were 4-year-olds, 40.4 % were 5-year-olds, and 37.4% were 6-year-olds

Materials

The Home Math Literacy Environments Questionnaire (HMLEQ)

The HMLEQ (Hong, 2011) is a measurement for the math literacy environment at home It is composed of four subscales of solitary play materials and space, math activities related with games, parental involvement and support, and didactic math learning

activities Twenty items were rated on a 4-point Likert-type scale The Cronbach alpha reliability was 84 (ranged 78 for play material and space, 51 for math activity related games, 81 for parental involvement and support, and 52 for math learning)

Table 1 Description of Home Math Literacy Environment Questionnaire

Play space and

play area for child, solitary play materials, such as unit blocks, Lego blocks, dominos, and puzzles etc

Math play

related to game 5

playing games with a dice, card games, and board games, which are play with parent or sibling

Parental

involvement

and support

4

encouraging counting, demonstrating counting, engaging in math talk, such

as labeling shape or numeral, correcting child’ mistakes, visiting supermarket, postoffice or bank with child, showing how to use number in daily life, etc

Math learning

activities 6

doing worksheet every day, math learning with a visiting teacher, or attending private math class

The Test of Math Ability of Young Children using pictures (TMAY)

The TMAY (Hwang & Choi, 2007) is a standard measurement for the mathematics ability of young children It is composed of four subscales: algebra, number and operation, geometry, and measurement Sixty items were scored as correct or incorrect The Cronbach alpha reliability were 94 (ranged 75 for geometry, 81 for algebra, 85 for number and operation, and 82 for measurement)

The Test of Disposition toward Mathematics of Young Children (TDMY)

The (Yoon, 2010) is composed of six subscales: applicability, confidence, preservation, self-monitoring, adaptability, and interest Thirty-one items were rated on a 4-point Likert-type scale The Cronbach alpha reliability were 93(range 94 for flexibility, 89 for confidence, 96 for preservation, 87 for self-monitoring, 75 for applicability, and 82 for interest)

Data were analyzed by t-test and one-way ANOVA with the Sheffe test using the SPSS

Win 12.0 program

Overview of Home Math Literacy Environments

Age difference in Home Math Literacy Environments

To examine the age differences in Home Math Literacy Environments, analyses of variance were conducted As shown in Table 2, there were no significant differences in overall HMLE associated with age of children However, the analysis for two subscales, such as play related to math games and math learning activities, revealed significant differences in the age of children The Scheffe post-hoc tests were conducted to examine the age differences There were significant differences between 3-, 4-, 5- and 6-year-olds

in math play related to games (F (3, 476) = 5.095, p < 01)and in math learning activities (F (3,476) = 10.55, p < 001).

Table 2 Differences in math literacy environment associated with children’s ages

Play materials and space

.14

Math play related to games

5.095**

3-, 4-, 5-yr < 6-yr

Parental involvement

and support

.706

Math learning activities

10.55***

3-, 4-, 5-yr < 6-yr

HMLE

1.77

**p < 01, ***p < 001.

Figure 1 Differences in math literacy environment associated with children’s ages

Differences of mother’s education level in Home Math Literacy Environment

To examine the differences of mother’s educational level in Home Math Literacy Environments, analyses of variance were conducted As shown in Table 3, there were significant differences in overall HMLE associated with mother’s education level The Scheffe post-hoc tests revealed significant differences among three education levels

(F (2,477) = 5.05, p < 01) The analysis for two subscales, such as play material & space

and parental involvement and supports, revealed significant differences in mother’s education levels The results of Scheffe post-hoc tests showed that there were significant differences among high school, 2-year, and 4-year colleges in play materials & space

(F (2,477) = 13.52, p < 001)and in parental involvement and support(F (2,477) = 3.73, p

< 05)

Table 3 Differences in math literacy environment associated with mother’s education

Play materials

and space

high school

< 2-yr., 4-yr college

Community college (2 yrs.) 170 16.73 2.93

Math play related

to games

.01 Community college (2 yrs.) 170 5.30 1.52

Parental

involvement and

support

high school

< 2-yr., < 4-yr college

Community college (2 yrs.) 170 21.69 3.06

Math learning

activities

.61 Community college (2 yrs.) 170 5.11 2.03

HMLE

high school

< 2-yr., < 4-yr college

Community college (2 yrs.) 170 48.82 6.94

*p < 05, **p < 01, ***p < 001.

Figure 2 Differences in home math literacy environment associated with mothers’ education

Differences of regular private math class attendance in Home Math Literacy Environments

To examine the differences of regular private math class attendance in Home Math Literacy Environments, analyses of variance were conducted As shown in Table 4, there were significant differences in overall HMLE associated with regular private math class

attendance (F (1,478) = 52.84, p < 001) There were significant differences in play materials and space between attending and not attending math class (F (1,478) = 9.39,

p < 01), activities related to math game(F (1,478) = 5.77, p < 05), parental involvement

and support(F (1,478) = 13.07, p < 001), and math learning activities(F (1,478) = 219.93,

p < 000) The overall results showed children with regular private math class attendance

had higher than those who did not attend regular private math class in HMLE

Table 4 Differences in math literacy environment associated with children’s attendance in regular private math class

Play materials

and space

999.39**

Math play related

to games

555.77*

Parental

involvement and

supports

313.07***

Math learning

activities

219.93***

HMLE

552.84***

*p < 05, **p < 01, ***p < 001.

Figure 3 Differences in home math literacy environment associated with children’s attendance in

regular private math class

Other variables in Home Math Literacy Environments

The differences of other variables, such as mothers’ ages, mothers’ working, and residential areas in HMLE, also were analysed by ANOVA The results of these variables revealed no significant differences in Home Math Literacy Environments

Math Ability, Disposition toward Math, and HMLE

Relation between math ability and Home Math Literacy Environments

Secondly, to examine how aspects of home math literacy environment were related

to child’s math ability and disposition, the correlation analysis was conducted The overall math ability was not significantly correlated with HMLE, as shown in Table 5 However, math ability was significantly correlated with aspect of parental involvement and support

(r = 24, p < 05) and not with math learning activities.