Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Shared Developmental Trajectories For Fractional Reasoning And Fine Motor Ability In 4 And 5 Year Olds, Lindsey Clark, John Shelley-Tremblay, Julie Cwikla

Faculty Publications

We investigated preschool-aged children’s understanding of early fractional tasks and how that performance correlates with fine motor skills and use of gestures while counting. Participants were 33 preschoolers aged 4 to 5 in two Southeastern public elementary schools. Children were tested individually in an interview-like setting. Mathematics tasks were presented in a paper and pencil format and the Grooved Pegboard test assessed fine motor skills. Finally, utilization of gestures was evaluated by taking a behavioral rating of the child’s hand morphology, accuracy of gestures, and synchrony of gestures and spoken word while performing a counting task. Results indicate that performance …