Off-line metacognition in children with mathematics learning disabilities

This thesis is devoted to the relationship between off-line metacognition and mathematical problem solving skills in lower-elementary-school children. The question underlying this thesis is whether or not off-line metacognition has some ‘value added’ in the assessment and treatment of young children with mathematics learning disabilities. Since Flavell (1976), metacognition has become a general multidimensional construct. Unfortunately, despite all the emphasis on metacognition, it became clear that currently researchers use different concepts for overlapping phenomena and employ different methods to assess these phenomena. The purpose of this thesis is to help to clarify some of the issues on the conceptualization of metacognition. Furthermore, it is investigated if some of the metacognitive parameters can be combined into a smaller number of supervariables. It is concluded that off-line metacognitive skillfulness (a combination of prediction and evaluation skills) explains about 16% of the variance in mathematical problem solving in young children. Two instruments to unravel off-line metacognitive skillfulness (EPA and EPA2000) are presented. Several studies with EPA2000 (De Clercq, Desoete & Roeyers, 2000) appeared to underline the importance of off-line metacognition to differentiate children with mathematics learning disabilities from children with age-adequate mathematics performances. However, not all children with mathematics learning disabilities showed a metacognitive deficiency. Our data underlined that there might be a sort of mathematics learning disabilities spectrum, with different (meta)cognitive profiles in young children. It might therefore be important to assess off-line metacognitive skills in children with mathematics learning disabilities. Another question underlying this thesis is whether an intervention on off-line metacognition has some value added on the treatment of children with mathematics learning disabilities in grade 3. The findings from our intervention study indicated that prediction is a modifiable skill. Moreover, we found positive treatment outcomes by adding an aspect of off-line metacognition on traditionally used mathematical problem solving treatments. In addition, the findings of this thesis indicate that motivating children or ordinary exposure to mathematical problem solving exercises is not enough to stimulate children’s metacognitive skills. Off-line metacognitive skills need to be explicitly taught in order to develop

Clock reading: an underestimated topic in children with mathematics difficulties

Recent studies have shown that children with mathematics difficulties (MD) have weaknesses in multiple areas of mathematics. Andersson (2008), for example, recently found that children with MD perform significantly worse than other children on clock reading tasks. The present study builds on this recent finding and aims at a more profound understanding of the difficulties that children with MD experience with telling time. Therefore, clock reading abilities of 154 children with MD were compared to the ability of 571 average achieving children and a qualitative error analysis was performed. The results of this study confirm the earlier finding of Andersson (2008) that children with MD perform worse on clock reading than average achieving children, and additionally shows that children with MD are especially struggling the combination of procedural and retrieval strategies that are needed to read complex five minute and one minute clock times. Children with MD make more errors that reflect immature counting strategies and deficits in memory retrieval. This finding is in line with Geary’s (2005) theory of subtypes in MD, that argues that children with MD have problems with mathematical procedures and semantic memory retrieval

Working memory in children with reading and/or mathematical disabilities

Elementary school children with reading disabilities (RD; n = 17), mathematical disabilities (MD; n = 22), or combined reading and mathematical disabilities (RD+MD; n = 28) were compared to average achieving (AA; n = 45) peers on working memory measures. On all working memory components, 2 (RD vs. no RD) x 2 (MD vs. no MD) factorial ANCOVAs revealed clear differences between children with and without RD. Children with MD had lower span scores than the AA children on measures of the phonological loop and the central executive. A significant interaction effect between RD and MD was found only for listening recall and had a small, partial effect size. In addition, analyses showed that the best logistic regression model consisted of a visuospatial and a central executive task. The model significantly distinguished between the AA and clinical groups and between the MD and RD+MD groups. Evidence was found for domain-general working memory problems in children with learning disabilities. Management of working memory loads in structured learning activities in the classroom, at home, or during therapy may help these children to cope with their problems in a more profound manner