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Improving Mathematics Teaching in

Kindergarten with Realistic
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Michail Kalogiannakis, Stamatis Papadakis, Nicholas Zaranis

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Early Childhood Educ J
DOI 10.1007/s10643-015-0768-4
Improving Mathematics Teaching in Kindergarten with Realistic
Mathematical Education
Stamatios Papadakis1 • Michail Kalogiannakis2 • Nicholas Zaranis2
Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016
Abstract The present study investigates and compares
the influence of teaching Realistic Mathematics on the
development of mathematical competence in kindergarten.
The sample consisted of 231 Greek kindergarten students.
For the implementation of the survey, we conducted an
intervention, which included one experimental and one
control group. Children in the experimental group were
taught Realistic Mathematics according to the principles of
Realistic Mathematics Education. The control group was
taught mathematics following the basic pedagogical prin-
ciples of curriculum for kindergarten students. In order to
evaluate the mathematical performance of children we used
the Test of Early Mathematics Ability (TEMA-3). The
results showed that the teaching technique with the use of
Realistic Mathematic Education contributed significantly
to the development of mathematical competence of young
children. Moreover, factors such as gender, age and non-
verbal cognitive ability, did not seem to differentiate the
development of mathematical competence of children.
Keywords Realistic Mathematics Education

Mathematics
Early childhood education
Kindergarten

TEMA-3
& Stamatios Papadakis
stpapadakis@gmail.com
1
Secondary Education Teacher, Crete, Greece
2
Department of Preschool Education, Faculty of Education,
University of Crete, Crete, Greece
Introduction
Interest in early childhood and especially in kindergarten
mathematical education is constantly increasing. Kinder-
garten education is away to counteract mathematical illit-
eracy, which nowadays is considered as detrimental as
linguistic illiteracy (Doliopoulou 2007; Clements and
Sarama 2013; Ginsburg 2004; Linder et al. 2011). A
number of research findings confirms that the teaching of
mathematical concepts in kindergarten education, as it
facilitates the transition to formal mathematical knowledge
(Nunes and Bryant 1996) by laying cognitive foundations
in children’s ability to master the systematic teaching of
‘‘real’’ mathematical concepts in later educational steps
(Balfanz et al. 2003). According to recent perceptions in
the area of mathematical teaching, in order for the above
transition to be achieved, the mathematical concepts and
ideas must be approached with the use of ‘‘context’’
problems (Van Den Heuvel-Panhuizen 2003, 2008) that are
meaningful for children and relevant to their experiences
(Ginsburg 1999; Ginsburg et al. 2004).
Researchers dealing with mathematical education
emphasize the importance and contribution of Realistic
Mathematical Education (RME) in the teaching of mathe-
matics (Treffers 1991). In contrast with the mechanistic
teaching approach for mathematics, RME ‘‘invests’’ in the
solution of a problem through children’s preexisting
informal knowledge (Van den Brink 1991). However,
while the positive influence of RME on the teaching of
mathematical concepts even in the area of preschool edu-
cation (Van den Heuvel-Panhuizen 1996, 2008) is
acknowledged, there is little research on the teaching of
Realistic Mathematics in preschool children.
The purpose of the current research is to compare the
influence of a teaching didactic approach based on RME,
123

on the development of mathematical ability of kindergarten
children.
Theoretical Background
Importance of Mathematical Training
in Kindergarten
In recent decades, there have been short periods of rein-
forcement and long periods of devaluation of mathematical
training during early childhood and particularly in kinder-
garten (Clements and Sarama 2009). Educators, under the
influence of Piaget’s views, have been forming curricula in
kindergarten, based on the perception that young children
cannot comprehend important mathematical meanings
(Ginsburg 2004). For decades, preschool and early school
age was approached as the age during which children were
engaged in childish activities without any particular ori-
entation and direction (Perry and Dockett 2002; Ginsburg
2004).
In recent years, there is a continuously increasing
international interest for kindergarten mathematical edu-
cation, as kindergarten education is identified as a high
priority target for tackling mathematical illiteracy, which
nowadays is considered as important as linguistic illiteracy
(Clements and Sarama 2013; Linder et al. 2011). Aspects
of children’s informal mathematical knowledge, such as
initial counting and problem solving, recognition of sym-
metries and geometric knowledge, are growing quite
impressively during the preschool and early childhood age,
thus forming the prerequisites for the acquisition of typical
mathematical knowledge in school (Clements et al. 2003).
On the other side, deficient teaching of mathematics in
kindergarten hinders the consolidation of basic mathemat-
ical knowledge, which is useful to children during their
following school course and the absence of which,
according to many researchers, is responsible for the extent
failure of students in mathematics. The phenomenon of
children handling mathematics very well in the classroom
while handling the same mathematics poorly in everyday
life, is common place in education (Nunes and Bryant
1996). At the same time, several international research
efforts reveal that schoolchildren cannot approach basic
mathematical concepts and problems (Chard et al. 2008;
Gersten et al. 2005; Jordan et al. 2006).
Often, teaching in kindergarten devalues children’s prior
knowledge and imposes mathematical knowledge that has
no meaning to them (Copley 1999). Mathematics will
attract children’s interest when children themselves realize
that mathematics is a tool for solving real world problems.
One way that kindergarten teachers can achieve this is by
utilizing problems from children’s everyday life as a means
123
Early Childhood Educ J
of teaching mathematics. Consequently, mathematical
learning should not take place in a neutral and abstract
world in which children’s experiences have no place.
Mathematics attracts children when they can connect their
mathematical knowledge to realistic meanings, through
which they can comprehend why and how certain calcu-
lations are made for the solution of a problem (Nunes and
Bryant 1996). A modern preschool mathematical education
is not interested in imposing premade ideas and meaning-
less procedures in the minds of children. It is oriented
towards a complete multifaceted development of children
as students and as persons enabling them to think and act in
a mathematical way (Clements and Sarama 2007, 2009;
Jacobi-Vessels et al. 2014; Jordan et al. 2009; Locuniak
and Jordan 2008). Additionally, the interactions between
teachers and students in learning settings, make it a suit-
able measure for examining the quality of mathematics
teaching in kindergarten settings (Kilday and Kinzie 2009).
Realistic Mathematics Education
Realistic Mathematics Education (RME) is a mathematics
teaching theory, which was developed by the Freudenthal
Institute in the Netherlands as a reform movement that
challenged the traditional, mechanistic approach mathe-
matical education (De Lange 1996; Van den Heuvel-Pan-
huizen and Wijers 2005). On one hand, the term RME
implies the connection between mathematics and reality
and on the other hand, the fact that the teaching aims that
are set while teaching mathematics do not exceed the
ability of teachers and schoolchildren to carry them out.
The theoretical approach to RME advocates that mathe-
matical learning is a constructive activity within the social
environment, in which teachers and schoolchildren interact
and cooperate with the aim of a progressive knowledge
acquisition by children (Streenfland 1993). The desired
processes are carried out with the use of suitable instruc-
tions or ‘‘context problems’’ while, necessary ‘‘course
adjustments’’ are achieved through social interaction (Van
den Brink 1989). RME emphasizes on careful, long-term
planning of educational processes, highlighting at the same
time the value and significance of schoolchildren’s ideas,
selecting problems that quite possibly reflect their potential
experiences or/and personal interests (Shiakalli and
Zacharos 2011).
In RME, the kindergarten educational approach follows
certain paths that allow children to develop spontaneous
strategies when confronting various situations while aiming
always towards generalization (Zaranis et al. 2013). The
goal is for children to understand that the usefulness of
mathematics lies on solving problematic situations that
they model through the process of gradual mathematization
(Gravemeijer 1994). Despite their frequent vagueness and
Early Childhood Educ J
boundary overlapping, we can distinguish two phases
during mathematization (Freudenthal 1991): horizontal and
vertical mathematization. Freudenthal (1991) briefly states
that horizontal mathematization contains a children’s
transition from the world of life to the world of symbols,
while vertical mathematization means that children tra-
verse the world of symbols. She distinction between these
two forms is not always clear because often one world can
expand in expense of the other in the favor of the educa-
tional process (Freudenthal 1983, 1991). Horizontal
mathematization practices are mainly met in the first
classes of primary school as well as in kindergarten. The
same mathematical process takes place during vertical
mathematization, as the learner faces each problem through
mathematical tools, namely with the use of abstract con-
cepts and symbols (Freudenthal 1983).
Specifically, in kindergarten, according to RME, an
elementary number sense is developed in three general
levels (van den Heuvel-Panhuizen 2008). A child conducts
in a particular level, if it ‘‘functions’’ effectively in that
level, in most cases with its participation in relatively
difficult examples. In these three levels, prior knowledge
that children ‘‘bring’’ with them when entering kinder-
garten, can be incorporated (Buys 2008). In conclusion, the
RME identifies four different levels of number sense
(ground or zero, first, second and third), which characterize
the knowledge of children about numbers, knowledge that
they have or may develop while attending kindergarten
(Fig. 1).
The relatively variable initial state, in which children,
with all their diversity, enter kindergarten, could be
described as the ground or zero level. In the first level,
basic numerical concepts such as counting calculations,
based on specific context, take place in meaningful, related
to the problem situations, in which questions like ‘‘how
many?’’ or questions in the form of comparisons may be
placed under appropriate form. The object-bound mea-
surement and calculating of the second level appears in
problem situations that focus directly on the quantitative
aspect. Unlike the first level, in this level questions like
‘‘how many?’’ are set and understood. However, children
can understand this type of problems only if the relevant
Fig. 1 The four levels of basic
number sense (van den Heuvel-
Panhuizen 2008)
questions relate to specific objects such as ‘‘how many
pencils are in the box?’’ or ‘‘how many balloons are
there?’’ etc. (Treffers 2008; van den Heuvel-Panhuizen
2008).
Therefore, a key question that arises has to do with, how
the transition from the first (context connected) to the
second level (object connected) will be facilitated in the
most effective manner. The answer seems to lie in the
gradual push of the context to the background. The
teaching benefit from the gradual shift of the context is that
the initial condition associated with the context remains
essentially available for children who may still need it. In
this way, the context serves as a model in which children
are able to acquire the foundation they need in order to be
able to interpret and respond to the question ‘‘how?’’. This
leads them into efficient counting and calculating of
specific objects. Once the child has reached the second
level, he or she is able to work in a diverse and wide range
of measurement and calculation operations. Using pure
enumeration and calculating of the third level, a question
such as, ‘‘how many remain if I get three out of seven’’ is
understood and answered properly by the children using
their fingers. In this manner, counting ceases to be bound to
objects and it is transferred to physical or mental repre-
sentations of objects. These representations can be partic-
ularly helpful in understanding different abstract levels,
including the use of ‘‘net’’ figures. An example is the
activity in which one asks children to determine a child’s
age at a birthday party (Treffers 2008).
Study Overview
From the above theoretical context, one can deduce that it
is important to study influences on the development of
kindergar ten children’s mathematical competence, inves-
tigate a teaching practice in kindergarten based on RME
principles, and compare traditional methods of teaching
mathematics with the RME instructional approach. For this
reason, this research aims to comparing the influence
exerted on the development of the mathematical ability of
kindergarten children, by using a didactic method based on
123

RME. A co-examination of the effect of various other
factors, such as gender, age, and nonverbal cognitive
ability was conducted while assessing the impact of
teaching technique on the development of mathematical
ability.
Based on the literature review, we make the following
hypotheses:
H1. The initial mathematical ability performance of the
experimental group and the control group will increase
significantly after the intervention.
H2. The mathematical ability performance of children
taught mathematics with the traditional method will be
significantly lower than the mathematical ability of chil-
dren taught mathematics with the RME.
H3. The mathematical ability performance of children
taught mathematics with the traditional method is signifi-
cantly lower than the mathematical ability of children
taught mathematics with the RME, and will not be affected
by various other factors such as nonverbal cognitive ability,
gender and the age of children.
Method
Sample
Sample selection took place in October 2013. The tech-
nique of multistage or two-stage sampling—which com-
bines simple stratified sampling and cluster sampling—was
selected in order to achieve this goal (Cohen et al. 2007).
The research sample consisted of 231 kindergarten children
(116 boys, 155 girls). The age of the children ranged
between 4 and 6 years (M = 66.0 months, SD = 5.2
months). The children attended classes in public and pri-
vate kindergartens in Greece during the school year
2013–2014. The sample was homogeneous in terms of
demographics such as ethnicity and language. In addition,
before initiation of the first phase of research, all necessary
permissions were taken from the Greek Institute of Edu-
cation Policy (IEP) (No. Orig. U15/976/162735/C1).
Research Design
For the verification of the research hypotheses, an experi-
mental procedure was designed, in which the sample was
divided into two groups, the control and the experimental
group. The experimental design included three phases:
(a) the pre-experimental control phase, during which the
measurement of the dependent variable was performed;
(b) the experimental phase, during which the manipulation
of the independent variable took place and (c) the post-
123
Early Childhood Educ J
experimental control phase, during which the post-control
of the dependent variable was performed. Before the
experimental procedure, the pre-research procedure took
place, in which the Greek version of the criterion TEMA-3
was tested. The Institutional Review Board (IRB) of the
University of Crete reviewed the scientific merit of the
research, the validity of the research strategy and the
adherence to the accepted practices in the respective field
of study for human subject research protocols.
Pre-research Procedure
Given that the original TEMA-3 criterion is in the English
language, in this research the researchers used a version of
the criterion TEMA-3, translated into the Greek language.
However, the simple translation or adaptation of a weigh-
ted test in the Greek language is not sufficient to transfer its
psychometric properties in the Greek reality. Therefore,
before the start of the first phase of the research, the
researchers conducted pilot implementations of the Greek
version of the TEMA-3 criterion in kindergartens not
included in the research sample. The aim was to assess
possible difficulties and misunderstandings by young
children, which possibly related to the translation of the
criterion in Greek language, the use of the supporting
material and particularly the administration of the exami-
nation. The assessment of the findings of the pilot imple-
mentation did not lead to significant changes and
modifications to the structure of the instrument or to
changes in the examination procedures.
Research Procedure
The research procedure lasted from November 2013 until
May 2014 and included the pre-experimental procedure,
the experimental intervention and post-experimental pro-
cedure. The pre-experimental procedure, which was com-
mon to all groups, took place during November and
December of the school year 2013–2014. In this phase,
children were asked to tackle questions-activities of two
different tests. The first test presented to children was the
Raven’s Colored Progressive Matrices (CPM) and the
second test was the Test of Early Mathematics Ability
(TEMA-3). The evaluation in each test lasted for
10–30 min, depending on the performance of each child.
All first phase meetings were completed prior to the start of
the teaching of mathematics in order to check the sys-
tematic mathematical teaching, which could exert a posi-
tive effect on children’s mathematical knowledge. Children
who were absent on the days the tests were administered
were not included in the sample.
Early Childhood Educ J
The experimental intervention took place between Jan-
uary and April of the school year 2013–2014. The activities
of the interventionist-experiential approach included
experiential games, stories and mathematic scenarios. They
were based on the RME approach and on the prior
knowledge and experiences of young children, resulting in
familiar and rich stimuli and a learning environment that
encouraged their creative imagination. The teaching aids
contained original everyday life objects and were designed
carefully to meet the daily reality of children (everyday
products, coins). Each week’s teaching intervention was
associated with a different level of number sense in pre-
school education (ground, first, second and third level)
according to the RME (Van den Heuvel-Panhuizen 2008).
In the control group, the teacher of each kindergarten in
accordance with the thematic approach conducted mathe-
matics teaching, as the Greek Curriculum of Studies for
kindergarten education defines it. Children who were
absent in more than two teaching interventions were
excluded from the survey. The second phase of the research
was completed by the end of the teaching intervention.
The post-experimental procedure was carried out in May
of the school year 2013–2014. During this phase, there was
a meeting with every child of the three groups. At this
meeting, each child was examined once again using the
TEMA-3. Testing followed the same procedure as that used
during the pre-test phase.
The ethical considerations and guidelines concerning the
privacy of individuals and other relevant ethical aspects in
social research were carefully taken into account through-
out the whole research process. Requirements concerning
information, informed consent, confidentiality and usage of
data were carefully met, both orally and in writing, by
informing the preschool staff, children and guardians on
the purpose of the study and their rights to refrain or
withdraw from participation.
Organization of Activities During the Teaching
Intervention Phase
Description of Activities in the Control Group
The objective of mathematical education in modern Greek
kindergarten is no longer the formal learning of concepts
and procedures but the development of a thinking that
exploits features of mathematics. It is intended that chil-
dren will begin to think in mathematical ways, realizing the
value of the use of mathematics in real life. Children,
through daily actions and their interaction with the envi-
ronment, gradually explore all five axes whose trajectories
are developed in the program of mathematics, such as
numbers and operations, space and geometry,
measurements, stochastic mathematics and introduction to
algebraic thinking. This management of mathematical
concepts in kindergarten education can only be approached
through interdisciplinary approaches. Interdisciplinary
unification will directly connect the school with the real
life of children in order to fully take advantage of chil-
dren’s interests, ideas, and experiences in the learning
process (Helm and Katz 2011). To achieve this aim,
teachers provide children with a well-organized learning
environment, rich in discrete and continuous materials, in
order for children to approach the mathematical ideas in
various ways, such as playing, observing, discovering
properties etc.
Description of Activities in the Experimental Group
The interventional teaching of each day, which was part of
the daily teaching routine, was devoted to the teaching of
realistic mathematics through a thematic approach. With
the term ‘‘thematic teaching-approach’’, we mean the
theme-based approach of knowledge and not the teaching
of discrete objects (Endsley 2011). The teaching inter-
vention was aimed at developing the logical-mathematical
thinking of children. The intervention activities were
designed according to the RME. They were based on prior
knowledge of children in numbers and tried to an extended
it in an entertaining way through contexts familiar to them.
The problems which children were asked to solve were
presented in the form of stories and daily activities familiar
to them, such as visiting a grocery store or a museum.
Particular attention was given to the numbers used in order
to reflect reality (tickets, commodity prices, money).
Activities were organized into four distinct levels of
increasing difficulty. For each teaching level, digital
activities followed respective experiential activities of the
same level.
With these activities, children extended their knowledge
and developed their own mental models for the mathema-
tization of problems. The activities were organized into
four levels (Van den Heuvel-Panhuizen 2008). In every
level, there was an introduction of a new learning com-
ponent, which increased the difficulty of each activity.
Figure 2 illustrates some of the experiential activities of
children.
Data Collection Instruments
Nonverbal Cognitive Ability Measurement Test
For the evaluation of children’s nonverbal cognitive ability,
the nonlinguistic Coloured Progressive Matrices (CPM)
123

Fig. 2 Illustrations from the experiential activities of children
test was used (Raven 1956; Wright et al. 1996). This is a
nonverbal test, which was developed to assess the cognitive
ability of children between the ages of 5–11 years, and
consists of 36 questions of graded difficulty. In this test, the
oral instructions are kept to a minimum because the test
includes only visuospatial exercises with shapes following
a standard pattern or formation.
Test of Early Mathematics Ability (SELA-3)
For the evaluation of children mathematical ability per-
formance before and after the teaching intervention, the
Test of Early Mathematics Ability, third edition (TEMA-
3) was administered. The TEMA-3 was developed by
Ginsburg and Baroody (2003) and is the most updated
version of the Test of Early Mathematics Ability (TEMA)
developed by the aforementioned researchers in 1983
(Ginsburg and Baroody 2003). The TEMA-3 can be used
as a norm-referenced measure or as a diagnostic instru-
ment to determine specific strengths and weaknesses in
math skills for children between the ages of 4 years and
0 months (4–0) and 8 years and 11 months (8–11). In
short, the concepts examined by the TEMA-3 are the
identification and writing of numbers, coiunting, com-
parison of sets and sorting of numbers as well as arith-
metic operations (numbering skills, number-comparison
facility, numeral literacy, mastery of number facts, cal-
culation skills, and understanding of concepts). Each of
these abilities is represented by a set of trials and/or
questions distributed across the test and are related to the
level of knowledge which the children should have ideally
achieved at a specified age.
123
Early Childhood Educ J
Results
Equivalence Checking of the Experimental Groups
Initially, the equivalence of the experimental and the
control group in terms of the children’s gender was tested.
The application of the Chi-square statistical criterion
showed that the experimental and the control group did not
differ significantly in the number of boys and girls inclu-
ded, X2(2) = .59, p [ .05. Subsequently, an analysis of
variance (ANOVA) showed that the experimental and the
control group were equivalent as to children’s age, F(1,
229) = 1.70, p [ .05 in the performance of children in the
nonverbal cognitive ability test (RAVEN), F(1,
229) = .88, p [ .05. Additionally, according to the results
of the ANOVA analysis, both groups revealed a non-sta-
tistically significant difference in terms of the performance
of children in the test of Early Mathematics Ability
(TEMA-3) before the start of the teaching intervention,
F(1, 229) = .64, p [ .05. Taking into consideration the
aggregated results concerning the formation on the
research teams, we concluded that the experimental and the
control group were equivalent in terms of: (a) age,
(b) gender, (c) nonverbal cognitive ability and (d) mathe-
matical ability, as expressed by children’s performance in
the TEMA-3 criterion.
Influence of the Experimental Intervention
in the Development of Mathematical Competence
of Children
The main purpose of this study was to investigate whether
the performance of children in mathematical ability
Early Childhood Educ J
increased significantly, after applying the techniques of
teaching using RME. According to the results of using
correlated t test there was, both in the experimental and in
the control group, increased performance of the children in
their mathematical ability, after the completion of the
experimental intervention (Fig. 3).
The difference between the performances of children in
each group during the two measurements is statistically
significant (Table 1).
Review of the Impact of the Experimental
Intervention in Performance Improvement
of Children in TEMA-3 Criterion
In addition to the final performance, it was considered
useful to investigate the effect of the experimental inter-
vention on the degree of improvement in the performance
of children in mathematical ability. For this purpose, we
calculated the difference in children’s performance in their
mathematical ability performance between the first—be-
fore the start of intervention—and the second measure-
ment—immediately after the intervention. According to
the results, the greatest improvement in the performance in
mathematical ability was demonstrated by children of the
experimental group (M = 5.94, SD = 4.43), followed by
children of the control group (M = 2.19, SD = 2.43). The
statistical control of the difference between the effects of
the experimental intervention on the degree of improve-
ment in the performance of children in TEMA-3 criterion
was performed using the ANOVA. The results indicated
that the intervention had a statistically significant effect on
the degree of improvement in the performance of children
in mathematical ability, in the experimental group, F(1,
229) = 61.52, p \ .01.
Fig. 3 Initial and final performance of children groups in mathemat-
ical ability
Table 1 Means (M), standard deviations (SD) children’s mathe-
matical ability
L SD t test (df = 121)
Experimental group
Mathematical competence
Pre-test 20.74 7.20 -14.82, p \ .01
Post-test 26.68 7.97
L SD t test (df = 108)
Control group
Mathematical competence
Pre-test 21.45 6.22 -8.23, p \ .01
Post-test 23.48 6.27
Effect of Cognitive and Other Factors
on the Development of Mathematical Ability
of Children
A key question in this study was whether the effect of the
experimental intervention in the performance of the chil-
dren in mathematical ability were affected and thus dif-
fered due to initial differences in cognition. The results of
using Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient
indicated that there was no correlation between the age of
children, r(231) = .11, p [ .05 and the nonverbal intel-
lectual ability, r(231) = .01, p [ .05, in the improvement
of their performance in mathematical ability. Respectively,
to investigated the effect of the gender of the children as a
differentiating factor in the extent of improvement in per-
formance in mathematical ability, a t test for independent
samples was applied. The results of the test showed that the
effect of gender in the improvement in the performance of
children’s mathematical ability was not statistically sig-
nificant, t(229) = -1.13, p [ .05, namely, gender did not
seem to be an influence on children’s performance in
mathematical ability.
Additionally, through the criterion of factorial variance
analysis there was a study of the effects of more than one
independent variable on the dependent variable, improve-
ment in the performance of children’s mathematical ability
and the interactions between them. The results indicated
that in all cases the only main significant effect in the
extent of improvement in children’s performance in
mathematical ability was the experimental intervention.
Table 2 summarizes the results of the effects of the main
independent variables, as well as of the interactions with
the independent variable of the experimental intervention
in the extent of the improvement in children’s final per-
formance in mathematical ability, which emerged from the
present study.
123

Table 2 Results of the effects
Main effects—interaction
of the main independent
variables and their interactions Gender
Gender * teaching intervention
Age
Age * teaching intervention
Nonverbal cognitive ability
Nonverbal cognitive ability * teaching intervention
The asterisk signifies interaction between the variables
Confirmation of Research Hypotheses
The purpose of this study was to investigate and compare
the influence exercised on the development of mathemat-
ical ability in kindergarten students, by a didactic approach,
according to the principles of RME, which was applied in
the teaching of mathematics to young children. In addition,
the main purpose of this study was to examine whether the
effect exerted by the didactic approach according to the
principles of RME was affected by various other factors.
The first hypothesis (H1) was verified, as statistical
analysis showed that the mathematic didactic approach,
according to the principles of RME contributed signifi-
cantly in the improvement of children’s performance in the
criterion of mathematical ability assessment.
The second hypothesis (H2) was verified too, as that, the
performance of the experimental and the control group in
children’s mathematical ability differ significantly after the
intervention, depending on each didactic approach. In the
intervention, where teaching according to RME was
applied, children showed a higher final performance and a
significantly greater improvement in their mathematical
ability after the intervention, in comparison to the control
group.
The third hypothesis (H3) was also verified. The per-
formance of the experimental and the control group in
mathematical ability differed significantly after the inter-
vention, depending on the didactic approach, even after the
control of various other factors related to the development
of mathematical ability such as age, gender and nonverbal
cognitive ability. Additionally, the effect of the experi-
mental intervention on the improvement of children’s
performance in mathematical ability was not differentiated
by the age of children, their gender, and their nonverbal
cognitive ability.
Conclusions
Holistically, our results suggest that teaching of realistic
mathematics is a didactic approach with a positive effect,
on the development of mathematical competence in
123
Early Childhood Educ J
Improvement in mathematical ability
F(1, 227) = 1.67, p [ .05
F(1, 227) = .06, p [ .05
F(19, 192) = .84, p [ .05
F(18, 192) = .98, p [ .05
F(21, 195) = 1.12, p [ .05
F(13, 195) = 1.07, p [ .05
kindergarten. Children acquire mathematical knowledge
through teaching approaches that emphasize experiential
activities and realistic problems. The active participation of
children in the resolution of those problems is considered
as an important element of a teaching environment suit-
able for the conquest of basic mathematical concepts. In
this context, the current research is consistent with other
international research (Bowman et al. 2001; Clements
2001; Sarama and Clements 2004; Jordan et al. 2006),
which indicate active involvement of children in the
learning process as the most important factor in designing
effective teaching interventions aiming at the development
of children’s mathematical ability.
This result accords well with earlier literature showing
that when the mathematical activities that take place in a
school, are meaningful and help children approach the
mathematical knowledge and discover mathematical con-
cepts through various kinds of stimuli, can effectively help
them develop their mathematical ability (Balfanz et al.
2003; Clements et al. 2003; Clements and Sarama 2013;
Ginsburg 2004; Nunes and Bryant 1996; Clements and
Sarama 2009).
Additionally, our data suggest that gender, age, and
nonverbal cognitive ability are not important influencing
factors on children’s performance with regard to the cri-
terion for the assessment of mathematical ability. The
results of the study regarding gender, are also supported by
international research (Aunola et al. 2004; Jordan et al.
2006), which shows that there is no gender differentiation
in math performance in kindergarten. The influence—at a
non–statistically significant level—of the nonverbal cog-
nitive ability on children’s performance during the last
administration of TEMA-3, is not in line with the results of
previous studies (Pascale et al. 2010; Shelton et al. 2010),
which highlight the close relationship between the working
memory and intelligence. It seems that the didactic
approach, which was used in the experimental group,
helped children who had weak memory mechanisms to
improve their mathematical ability significantly. Finally, as
far as age is concerned, the non-statistically significant
effect of children’s age contrasts the findings of other
studies that indicate age as a significant predictor of the
Early Childhood Educ J
overall performance in number sense when they leave
kindergarten (Jordan et al. 2006).
Discussion: Perspectives
The low math performance of children internationally
reflects the need for a different approach to teaching math
concepts, which is distinct from the traditional approach to
learning and teaching mathematics. Kindergarten children
arrive at school with informal numeracy knowledge which
can be expanded, enriched, an developed through appro-
priately designed learning activities. Consequently, it
would be interesting for kindergarten educators during
mathematics teaching to emphasize creating a different
learning environment. More specifically, it requires the
design of learning approaches that will be linked to the
experiences of children, will attract their interest and
gradually will lead them to the construction of formal
numeracy. The didactic approach, which is based on the
principles of RME, is not particularly interested in the
instrumental aspect of knowledge. Instead, it is based on
the idea of building knowledge by the children themselves,
and is considered highly fruitful for teaching mathematics
by an increasing number of researchers. As part of this
approach, kindergartners can derive the most benefit from
their informal mathematical knowledge and use it as a
foundation for further mathematical development.
The current research has some limitations. For its pur-
poses, a teaching intervention that lasted 14 weeks was
carried out. Although the length of the instructional inter-
vention can be considered satisfactory for the experimental
verification of the effects of various teaching approaches, it
is not always found sufficient to cover the range of the
learning objectives in the teaching of mathematics in
kindergarten. For this reason, it is necessary to design and
implement instructional interventions in kindergarten
education which would be longer in duration in order to
investigate extensively the effect of various teaching
techniques on the development of the wider mathematical
competence in kindergarten.
An important extension of this study would be the
implementation of a longitudinal research in order to study
the effects of the teaching technique of Realistic Mathe-
matics Education on the development of children’s math-
ematical ability during their first grade in primary school. It
is also important to extend the investigation through a
subsequent post-control of the performance of children in
the criteria of TEMA-3 in order to investigate whether the
effects of the teaching technique using RME is maintained
over time and if the technique has contributed to a long-
term growth in children’s mathematical ability.
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