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Number sense

Number sense

Number sense

Number sense is considered as an innate numeracy skill, which not only humans but also some animals, such as fish and birds have. As the name says, it refers to sense of numbers. Number sense enables us to estimate the number of cars on the parking lot without counting them on-by-one, or to tell whether there are more people queueing in one line or in the other one.

APPROXIMATE NUMBER SYSTEM (ANS)

It has been proposed that we use a system called approximate number system, ANS, when estimating magnitudes (e.g. object or dots) approximately, or making comparisons of numbers (1).

When testing what kind of number sense an individual has, researchers often use tasks, in which you need to compare a number of dots or number symbols. Those who have a good number sense often respond quicker and more accurately in these tasks compared to those with weaker number sense.

Look at the pictures.

Can you quickly estimate which of the pictures has more dots?

Number sense is considered as an innate numeracy skill, which not only humans but also some animals, such as fish and birds have. As the name says, it refers to sense of numbers. Number sense enables us to estimate the number of cars on the parking lot without counting them on-by-one, or to tell whether there are more people queueing in one line or in the other one.

APPROXIMATE NUMBER SYSTEM (ANS)

It has been proposed that we use a system called approximate number system, ANS, when estimating magnitudes (e.g. object or dots) approximately, or making comparisons of numbers (1).

When testing what kind of number sense an individual has, researchers often use tasks, in which you need to compare a number of dots or number symbols. Those who have a good number sense often respond quicker and more accurately in these tasks compared to those with weaker number sense.

Look at the pictures.

Can you quickly estimate which of the pictures has more dots?

Number sense is considered as an innate numeracy skill, which not only humans but also some animals, such as fish and birds have. As the name says, it refers to sense of numbers. Number sense enables us to estimate the number of cars on the parking lot without counting them on-by-one, or to tell whether there are more people queueing in one line or in the other one.

APPROXIMATE NUMBER SYSTEM (ANS)

It has been proposed that we use a system called approximate number system, ANS, when estimating magnitudes (e.g. object or dots) approximately, or making comparisons of numbers (1).

When testing what kind of number sense an individual has, researchers often use tasks, in which you need to compare a number of dots or number symbols. Those who have a good number sense often respond quicker and more accurately in these tasks compared to those with weaker number sense.

Look at the pictures.

Can you quickly estimate which of the pictures has more dots?

iSeeNumbers

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iSeeNumbers
- Feb 18, 2020
- 1 min read

Tracking data in Uppsala

One part of our project focuses on eye-tracking (ET) individual differences in math skills. As most of the team members are quite new in this field, last autumn we decided to first conduct a pilot study with some university students, in order to learn well the basics of conducting this type of research. Later on in autumn, we collected the first ET data with the children participating the project.

Between and after the data collections, we have familiarized ourselves more with the programs that can be used for analyzing eye-tracking data. To learn even more, some of the team members just spent a couple of days in Uppsala, digging into the data more in detail, guided by one of the collaborators expert in the ET field.

The data files, which we initially get as the results of ET trials, are full of numbers, making not that much sense at first glance. With the first data set, we are mostly interested in looking at pupil dilations during the math tasks. Our collaborator guided us using TimeStudio for this purpose. After some work with TimeStudio, the data looked such that it could be used for further statistical analyses.

Working with TimeStudio

Results, the ones you either expect or not, often raise interesting and inspiring discussions with your colleagues – this time as well. These discussions are definitely one of the greatest and most fruitful moments in doing research.

The work goes on like a flowing water... (c) T. Throndsen

Plans for the first ET article were set, so the work goes on! The data from the core project with children will be exciting to start to work with a bit later on.

Recent Posts

End of the project

What have we found out so far?

Final data collection – completed!

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