"Which Character is Leading?": Examining Latent Growth in Children's Accuracy During Tablet-Based Math Gameplay

• In Event: Poster Session 05
  In Poster Session: PS 05 Topic - Cognitive Processes

Abstract

For young children, playing math training games has been shown to lead to improvements in math skills (Ramani et al., 2019). Because math ability in early childhood is predictive of academic achievement through adolescence (Watts et al., 2014), understanding predictors of growth in children’s early math skills has implications for promoting greater math achievement. The current study aims to examine the effects of a tablet-based training game on growth in kindergartener's math understanding, as well as predictors of growth in children’s math abilities over training sessions.

Participants were 118 kindergarteners (Mage=5.27 years, 43% female) recruited from public and charter schools on the east coast and west coast of the United States serving predominantly low-income families. As part of a larger study, children completed five sessions of tablet-based math training. Prior to completing math training, children were randomly assigned to complete five additional sessions of either working memory training or active control training. Children also completed pretest and posttest measures of math and working memory skills. Math measures included magnitude comparison, number line estimation, and addition. Working memory measures included complex span, forward corsi span, and following directions tasks. Children’s parents also completed a survey of demographic information. At present, all data collection for the study has been completed.

Children's five sessions of math game training were completed over two weeks, each lasting about 15-20 minutes. During each session, children played a 0 to 100 math board game on a tablet. Each time they played the game, children were asked nine questions probing their understanding of math concepts in the game (e.g., Which character is leading?). Questions were scored dichotomously as correct or incorrect. The proportion of questions correct in each session is used as a measure of accuracy.

Latent growth modeling will be used to examine changes in accuracy on in-game math questions over the 5 sessions of gameplay. Each session will be treated as an equal interval. Math ability and working memory ability will be included as latent predictors, and training condition and SES will be included as measured variable predictors. Data-model fit will be evaluated with RMSEA and SRMR values. Results will indicate if math training causes significant growth in children's understanding, if individual factors, such as math ability, working memory ability, and SES predict growth, and if completing working memory training prior to math training predicts growth in children's abilities beyond growth seen from only the math training. Results will be discussed in terms of the role of games for promoting children’s math learning, with emphasis on individual factors that predict growth in children’s math abilities.

Authors

• Mary DePascale, Boston College
  Presenting Author

• Susanne M. Jaeggi, University of California, Irvine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Geetha B. Ramani, University of Maryland - College Park
  Non-Presenting Author