Influences on and Impact of Mathematical Resilience in Year 1 Children
FUNDER
Coventry University
PROJECT TEAM
Katie Baker with supervision from Julia Carroll, Emma Vardy, Clare Wood and Donna-Lynn Shepherd
PROJECT OBJECTIVES
- To develop a scale to measure mathematical resilience in Year 1 children
- To monitor the mathematical resilience and performance in mathematics of Year 1 children over an academic year and find if the two are linked
- To assess whether mathematical resilience and performance in a mathematical task are linked
- To study how parents work with their children on mathematics and how this impacts their children’s performance
- To develop mathematical resilience based interventions to help parents support their children in mathematics and to assess the effectiveness of these interventions
IMPACT STATEMENT
The project will develop the first mathematical resilience scale for 5 and 6 year olds which will enable research into the development of mathematical resilience in young children. It will contribute to knowledge about the links between attitudes to mathematics and performance in Year 1 children. Thus it will help to assess the validity of promoting mathematical resilience as a tool to improve performance in mathematics.
The project will also develop an intervention to help parents support their children in mathematics and provide analysis of what is and is not successful. Such an intervention could be used by schools to improve the mathematical performance of their students and would benefit parents by ensuring the support they give their children is targeted and effective.
The project will also provide evidence in the debate about whether parental engagement in mathematics is positive or negative, highlighting some cases in which it may be negative and how these can be overcome.
