Just because young children know how to count doesn’t mean they know when to count. Children aged four and younger who have a mastery of counting may not have the confidence to use it when the situation demands, or they may not understand that it is required. Instead, they look to other cues, like density or length, to hazard a guess.

When groups of children aged four and five were asked to carry out three tasks which involved working out quantities, those who spontaneously counted tended to be older. When those who didn’t count in the first instance were given encouragement and prompted to do so, they then chose to count, in two exercises studied by researchers at Plymouth University. But those who received no encouragement continued to use their own methods of visual measurements. The implications for early years teachers is that feedback and encouragement have a strong influence on even young children’s use of counting skills.

“Four to five year olds’ spontaneous use of counting as a strategy and the effects of prompting and feedback”, a poster presentation to the British Psychological Society’s Developmental Section by Kirsti Capelin and Michael Fluck, Department of Psychology, University of Plymouth