Early Years Students’ Relationships with Mathematics

Date
2016-12-01
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Abstract
Early years mathematics experiences have been shown to be a significant predictor for students’ school readiness and future mathematics achievement. Previous research also indicates an important connection between emotion and mathematics learning. How do students in early years education in Alberta describe their emotional relationship with mathematics? This article documents the findings of our research focusing on Kindergarten to Grade 2 students. Our analysis showed that many students in the early years, including those at the Kindergarten level, recognized what is considered to be mathematics but mainly associated mathematics with number and numerical operations. The majority reported positive relationships with mathematics, though some described negative relationships with school mathematics learning.
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Keywords
Early years mathematics learning, Emotion
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