Patterns, Mathematics, Early Literacy, and Executive Functions

摘要

In the fall, kindergartners from 21 classrooms in four urban schools were randomly formed into trios and taught either mathematics or early literacy or social studies, or six types of complex patterns. Measures of mathematics, early literacy, executive functions (EF), and understanding of complex patterns were collected in late spring. Exploratory factor analysis indicated that the early literacy measures, one measure of inhibition, and both mathematics measures comprised one factor. Another inhibition measure, cognitive flexibility, working memory, patterning, and the computation mathematics measure comprised another factor. The correlations obtained and the factor analysis distinguish the cognitive and achievement measures and show the relations between them.