What Schemes Do Preschoolers Develop When Using Multi-touch Applications to Foster Number Sense (and Why)?

Abstract

As part of an educational project proposed in Italian pre-schools, an educator followed a protocol that had been used in a previous study (Baccaglini-Frank and Maracci in Digit Exp Math Educ 1:7–27, 2015) proposing two chosen iPad apps to children of ages five to six. This study investigates the schemes developed by the children in response to the apps, and the role the educator’s interventions seemed to play in such development. Analyses of the data collected suggest that her interventions privileged and encouraged schemes involving counting, which limited the variety of schemes enacted and the aspects of number sense strengthened through the protocol.