Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

The learning and generalization of patterns is an importantaspect of mathematical thinking, such that the ability toidentify and use patterns early in development predicts futuresuccess in algebra and math. Thus, understanding thecritical factors that facilitate this relational knowledge isimportant for the development of instructional materials andfor curriculum development. The aim of the present studywas to examine the factors that facilitate the learning andtransfer of pattern knowledge. In two experiments, 4- to 6-year-old children participated in a pre-post test design, inwhich they received training on novel patterns. Critically, wemanipulated (1) the language with which children wereexposed to novel patterns during training and (2) theperceptual format in which children were exposed to novelpatterns. We find that 4-6 year old children were able tolearn about novel patterns following this intervention, butfaired best when trained on abstract (“A-B-A”) rather thanconcrete (“red-blue-red”) labels. Furthermore, the extent towhich the training stimuli were grounded in visualrepresentations affected both learning and generalization ofthis newly acquired pattern knowledge. This work hasimplications for instructional design and curriculumdevelopment in the classroom.