Children\'s Mathematics

Early writing, early mathematics 65

Literacy

Chomsky’s (1965) Language

Acquisition Device (LAD) innate

structures somehow guide the consider

the ‘right’ possibilities among an

abundance of logical alternatives.

The social learning aspect was a

significant factor in children’s language

and literacy learning. Harste, Woodward

and Burke (1984): ‘Language whether

oral or written is a social event of some

complexity. Language did not develop

because of the existence of one language

user but two.’

‘Meaning is the key to reading’.

(Smith, 1978)

Children are powerful learners and

they know a considerable amount

about literacy before they come to

school (Clay, 1975; Hall, 1987).

Pre-reading and readiness are

questioned. Coltheart (1979)

demonstrated that reading readiness

has no basis. The way to learn to read

is by reading.

Markman (1990) suggests that children

narrow down alternatives by making

certain assumptions about word mean-

ings which constrain their guesses.

Barratt-Pugh (2000) proposes that

literacy learning is embedded in the

socio-cultural practices that children

are involved in.

Mathematics

Gelman and Gallistel (1978) suggest

that similar innate structures as in LAD

guide children learning to count. They

claim infants are born with a non-verbal

mechanism called an ‘accumulator’.

‘Mathematics knowledge is a social

category of knowledge’ (Nunes and

Bryant, 1996).

Hughes (1986) proposes that children

need meaningful and relevant

mathematical tasks.

Aubrey (1994b) found that pre-

schoolers had a considerable amount of

informal mathematical knowledge

before they enter school.

Durham Project (cited by Pettitt and

Davis, 1994) questions pre-number

concepts. From the evidence of their

research children learn about number

by counting objects in a variety of ways

and not by traditional pre-number

activities, e.g. sorting and matching.

Gelman (1991) proposes that the

counting principles (Gelman and

Gallistel, 1978) function as constraints

for number.

Worthington and Carruthers (Chapter

2 in this volume) argue that

mathematical learning is embedded in

the socio-cultural practices of the

child’s family, community and culture.

(Source: adapted from Carruthers, 1997c.)

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