Young children's symbolic magnitude understanding, or knowledge of how written numerals and number words can be ordered and compared, is thought to play an important role in their mathematical development. There is consistent evidence that symbolic magnitude skills predict mathematical achievement in later childhood and adulthood. Yet less is…

Data from a longitudinal investigation were used to examine the effects of mothers' and teachers' language on children's developing mathematical competencies during the kindergarten year. Specifically, 1) mothers' use of metamemory talk, or references to the process of remembering, and 2) teachers' use of "cognitive processing language"…

This study investigated longitudinal pathways leading from early spatial skills in first-grade girls to their fifth-grade analytical math reasoning abilities (N = 138). First-grade assessments included spatial skills, verbal skills, addition/subtraction skills, and frequency of choice of a decomposition or retrieval strategy on the…