Research Findings: The present study employed a time lag design to assess temporal relationships between motivation, academic achievement, and cognitive development. Eighty-one children from 2 preschool programs were measured twice, with an 11-week time lag, on 2 measures of motivation (marble drop task, bean bag toss task), 2 measures of…

A learning-set procedure was used to teach the oddity principle, insertions into series, and number conservation to 85 kindergarten children who did not grasp these abstractions. Control groups were given lessons in kindergarten literacy, numeracy, or art in sessions matched in timing and extent. The children who were taught the principles of…

Background: Children ordinarily begin their formal education at the age when the great majority of them are capable of understanding the role of addition and subtraction in changing number. In determining critical differences they can apply the oddity principle--the first "pure" abstraction that children ever develop--understanding that…

Seven-year-olds who had difficulty understanding 1st-grade work received one of two forms of small-group instruction. Half of the children were randomly assigned to receive four months of instruction in recognizing, comprehending, and reproducing both logical and arbitrary patterns (sequences) involving numbers, letters, shapes, colors,…

Although many students who enter kindergarten are cognitively ready to meet the demands of the kindergarten mathematics curriculum, some students arrive without the early abstract reasoning abilities necessary to benefit from the instruction provided. Those who do not possess key cognitive abilities, including understandings of conservation,…