The immediate impacts of preschool attendance on Turkish children's mathematics achievement

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The immediate impacts of preschool

attendance on Turkish children’s

mathematics achievement

Durmuş Aslana & Yaşare Aktaş Arnasa

a

Department of Early Childhood Education, Çukurova University, Adana, Turkey

Published online: 24 Sep 2014.

To cite this article: Durmuş Aslan & Yaşare Aktaş Arnas (2015) The immediate impacts of preschool attendance on Turkish children’s mathematics achievement, Educational Studies, 41:3, 231-243, DOI: 10.1080/03055698.2014.961901

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03055698.2014.961901

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The immediate impacts of preschool attendance on Turkish

children’s mathematics achievement

Durmuş Aslan*and Yaşare Aktaş Arnas

Department of Early Childhood Education, Çukurova University, Adana, Turkey (Received 27 June 2013;ﬁnal version received 29 August 2014)

This study was conducted to investigate the immediate impacts of preschool atten-dance on Turkish children’s mathematics achievement. The participants were 200 children who attended or did not attend preschool. The number and operation task and the geometric shapes sorting task were used as the data collection tools. The children who attended preschool performed signiﬁcantly better on the number and operation task and the geometric shapes sorting task than the children who did not attend preschool. Indeed, the multivariate regression analysis demonstrated that preschool attendance is the most important predictor of the success of children in number and operation task and the geometric shapes sorting task.

Keywords: preschool attendance; mathematics achievement; children

Introduction

The early stage of life is a remarkable growing period for children. Studies show that the preschool years are important for brain development. In his study on the development of the cerebral cortex, Lomroso (1998) stated that 90% of a child’s brain development occurs during the period in which a child starts preschool (cited in Tanner 2008). Levine (2005) stated that children experience substantial mental and emotional development during the preschool period. The cognitive, social and emotional skills that children develop during this period form the basis for their future learning life. Moreover, the pace at which children learn is directly related to whether they have a supportive environment and the quality of their experience in this environment (Gayl2007).

Preschool is an educational group experience for children between the ages of three and six that occurs before they start elementary school (Schulman and Barnett 2005). Three longitudinal studies (the Perry Preschool Project, the Abecedarian Early Childhood Intervention Programme and the Chicago Child–Parent Centre Pro-gramme) prove the long-term benefits of preschool. The findings of the research indicated that children who attended preschool had higher test scores; repeated clas-ses less often; were more likely to attend four-year colleges; needed fewer welfare benefits; were involved in crimes less often; displayed fewer anti-social behaviours; smoked and used drugs less often; and had higher incomes than the children who did not attend preschool (Schweinhart and Weikart1993; Landry 2004; Schweinhart et al.2005; Shaw2009; Valenti and Tracey2009; Brooks-Bey2011).

*Corresponding author. Email:[email protected]

Vol. 41, No. 3, 231–243, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03055698.2014.961901

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Studies analysing the long-term benefits of preschool attendance have recently focused on children’s academic achievement, especially in reading and mathematics (Yesil Dagli2006). Studies show that preschool attendance produces permanent ben-efits for children’s mathematics achievement. Kashkary and Robinson (2006) com-pared thefirst-, second- and third-grade mathematics achievement of 685 elementary school students who attended or did not attend preschool. The results showed that the children who attended preschool performed better infirst grade, and their supe-rior performance continued during second and third grade. Dursun (2009) reported that elementary students who attended preschool had higher achievement in mathe-matics than those who did not. Similarly, Maldonado (2008) found out that children who attended preschool had higher achievement in mathematics during third grade compared with those who did not. Brooks-Bey (2011) determined that the duration of preschool attendance also affects children’s academic achievement: the children who attended preschool for two years had better scores on mathematics tests than the children who attended preschool for one year. In addition, Brooks-Bey has deter-mined that children who did not attend preschool had lower mathematics scores than both of the groups who attended preschool.

Although there are many studies that show permanent long-term benefits of pre-school attendance, there are also some findings that indicate early schooling is not the best option for children (Shaw 2009). Adams (2008) found that there is no sig-nificant difference in academic output or social and emotional proficiency between first-, third- and fifth-grade students who attended preschool and those who did not. Conner (2008) and Nichols (2009) found that preschool attendance made no differ-ence in the mathematics achievement of third- and fourth-grade students. Similarly, Maripatricia (1996) determined that preschool was not associated with a significant difference in the mathematics achievement of third- and fourth-grade students. Pagani et al. (2004) found that early schooling did not provide a cognitive boost that led to a better performance in mathematics. Some studies indicate that preschool has a negative impact on children’s achievement in mathematics. Chhinh (2003) deter-mined that preschool attendance had a negative effect on mathematical output: chil-dren who did not attend preschool had significantly higher achievement in mathematics compared with the children who did.

These studies were not conducted with preschool children; they focused on older students who attended preschool or did not attend preschool. Testing the effects of the past sometimes causes misleading results. Therefore, in order to see the big pic-ture, we need studies that are conducted during children’s preschool age and that examine the immediate effects of preschool education.

Preschool education in Turkey

In Turkey, preschool education covers the education of children between the ages of 0 and 6. This education is conducted by day-care programmes for children between the ages of 0 and 3 and kindergarten programmes for children between the ages of 4 and 6.

In Turkey, preschool education is not compulsory and is left to the discretion of the parents. There are a number of reasons many parents do not send their children to preschool programmes: preschool education is costly and brings an additional ﬁnancial burden to families; the number of working mothers is low and they usually prefer home caregiving; in some families, grandmothers look after children; and

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there are not enough preschool education institutions. In recent decades, despite the attempts of government and non-governmental organisations to promote preschool education, the number of children attending preschool programmes has remained very low. As of 2011–2012, in Turkey, the preschool attendance rate of children between the ages of 4 and 6 is 44%. In the province of Adana, where this study was conducted, the preschool enrollment rate was below the national average at 33% (MEB2012).

Preschool education in Turkey is offered in public and private preschool institu-tions. Regardless of whether they attend public or private education institutions, all preschool children follow a common programme developed by the Turkish Ministry of National Education.

The preschool education programme implemented in Turkey is a developmental programme aimed at supporting 4- to 6-year-old children’s cognitive, social-emotional, psychomotor, language and self-care development. The objectives of the programme are listed according to the related development areas (language, cogni-tive, social and emotional, motor). In addition, the concepts that children are expected to learn through preschool education are identiﬁed in the programme.

Teachers prepare monthly plans by taking into account the developmental char-acteristics of the children. However, these plans are not exhaustive. They include only the objectives, concepts, parental involvement and activities outside the class-room that are determined for each month. Teachers then prepare daily plans based on the monthly plans and the developmental stages of the children. Although the objectives of the programme are identiﬁed, it is left to the teacher’s discretion to determine what type of activities is implemented, what kind of materials is used, and how to evaluate the process of achieving these targeted goals.

The daily programme is a framework plan, in which the teacher presents the details of the day’s work on a regular basis. It includes such activities as circle time, play time, activity time and reﬂection time, as well as routine activities such as eat-ing and rest time. Activity time might include activities related to language, play and exercise, music, science and mathematics, preparation for reading and writing, drama,ﬁeld trips and art (MEB2013).

Mathematics education in preschool

The math concepts and skills that children are intended to learn during preschool education in Turkey are included in the programme objectives related to cognitive development. These objectives include basic math concepts and skills, such as sort-ing, matchsort-ing, ordersort-ing, measursort-ing, countsort-ing, understanding algorithms, identifying geometric shapes, developing spatial perception, recognising symbols, telling time, solving problems and recognising graphics. The purpose of preschool mathematics education is not only to impart cognitive skills, but also to help children enjoy math-ematics, become excited about mathematics education and develop a positive atti-tude toward mathematics (Aktaş Arnas2012).

Teachers select objectives from the monthly plan by taking into account the chil-dren’s mathematics development level and include these in the daily plan. The tea-cher identiﬁes in the daily plan how to reach these objectives by describing what type of math activity to implement, which materials to use and how to assess chil-dren’s learning (MEB 2013). To teach mathematics, the teacher can use available concrete objects as well as educational toys, such as matching cards, jigsaw puzzles,

Educational Studies 233

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mobiles and worksheets. In each classroom, there is one math learning centre to ensure that the children learn by doing. Math learning centres are designed in such a way that children can work individually or in small groups. In these learning cen-tres, there are various materials with which children can work freely and that guide them to explore and research.

The teacher can include in the daily plan both formal mathematics activities and informal activities that can be implemented at any time of the day and in any place. The teacher can seize opportunities to employ informal mathematics activities to reinforce the concepts that were previously taught, even if the daily plan does not include the relevant objective for that day.

The teacher also attempts to reinforce the children’s learning by providing math skills in various activities during the day. For example, in a science activity, the tea-cher can ask the children to classify objects asﬂoating and sinking; in a music activ-ity, s/he can ask them to compare the shapes of the instruments or teach them songs involving math concepts; and in an art activity, s/he can ask them to make geometric shapes from play dough (Aktaş Arnas2012).

Aim

This study was conducted to analyse mathematics achievement among children ages 4–6 who attended or did not attend preschool. Speciﬁcally, we sought answers to the following questions:

Does preschool attendance have a signiﬁcant impact on children’s understand-ing of numbers and operations?

Does preschool attendance have a signiﬁcant impact on children’s understand-ing of geometric shapes?

Methods Participants

The study group consisted of 200 children between the ages of 4 and 6 who attended preschool (n = 100) or did not attend preschool (n = 100). To select the preschool children, three public preschools were randomly selected from the 12 pre-schools located in the district of Çukurova in the city of Adana, Turkey. The chil-dren attending these preschools (n = 390) were classiﬁed according to their age groups. In this sample, 28% of the children were 4 years old (n = 109), 42% were 5 years old (n = 164) and 30% were 6 years old (n = 117). One hundred children between the ages of 4 and 6 who attended these preschools were selected with a pro-portional random sampling method utilising random numbers (Babbie 2001). For example, to identify the 4-year-olds attending preschool, the 4-year-old children in these three preschools were listed randomly. Then, 28 of these children were selected by utilising random numbers. The children who attended preschool fol-lowed a common schedule prepared by the Turkish Ministry of National Education. To enrol children in the study who did not attend preschool, local administrators in the area in which the selected preschools were located were contacted and children who did not attend preschool (n = 892) were identiﬁed. In this sample, 29% of the children were 4 years old (n = 258), 41% were 5 years old (n = 366), and 30% were

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6 years old (n = 268). The children’s demographic information is presented in Table1.

Of the children who attended preschool, 28 were 4 years old (Range = 38–46 months, M = 43 months), 42 were 5 years old (Range = 50–59 months, M = 55 months) and 30 were 6 years old (Range = 62–71 months, M = 65 months). Of the children who did not attend preschool, 29 were 4 years old (Range = 38–47 months, M = 44 months), 41 were 5 years old (Range = 49–58 months, M = 54 months) and 30 were 6 years old (Range = 62–70 months, M = 65 months). There were 48 female children and 52 male children in the group of preschool chil-dren and 51 female chilchil-dren and 49 male chilchil-dren in the group that did not attend preschool.

Income, professions and educational levels of the parents in both groups showed similar characteristics. As Table 1 shows, the vast majority of children in both groups come from the conventional two parents families (The parents of eight of the children who attended preschool andﬁve of who did not attend were separated).

Of the children who attended preschool, 44 came from low-income families and 56 came from middle-income families, whereas 58 of the children who did not attend preschool came from low-income families and 42 came from middle-income families. Most of the mothers in both groups were primary school graduates, fol-lowed by mothers with high school degrees. Of the fathers of children who attended preschool, 40 were high school graduates and 37 were primary school graduates, whereas of the fathers of children who did not attend preschool, 42 were primary

Table 1. The distribution of children and their parents’ demographic characteristics. Group

Attend preschool

Do not attend preschool

Age 4-year olds 28 29

5-year olds 42 41

6-year olds 30 30

Gender Girl 48 51

Boy 52 49

Family type Divorced parents 8 5

Conventional two parents families 92 95 Family income Low (500$ and less) 44 58

Middle (501$–2500$) 56 42

Mother education Illiterate – 1

Primary school 44 50

High school 42 39

Graduate 14 10

Father education Primary school 37 42

High school 40 37

Graduate 23 21

Mother occupation Housewife 33 52

Fabric worker 30 29

Civil servants 25 13

Teacher 12 6

Father occupation Fabric worker 46 45

Artisans 21 33

Civil servants 18 12

Teacher 15 10

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school graduates and 37 high school graduates. In both groups, the majority of mothers were housewives, followed by blue-collar worker mothers. Finally, in both groups, the majority of fathers were factory workers, followed by artisan fathers.

Measurement tools

The number and operation task developed by Aktas Arnas, Deretarla-Gül, and Sigirtmaç (2003) and the geometric shapes sorting task developed by Aslan and Aktaş Arnas (2007) were used as data collection tools. Interview recording forms were also used to record the answers given by the children during the tests.

The number and operation task includes 88 items that test children’s abilities related to numbers and operations, including counting, writing numbers, recognising numbers, matching, conservation of number, working with ordinal numbers and sub-tracting. The number and operation task include items such as: “forward rhythmic counting from 1 to 20”, “forward rhythmic counting from 3 to 10”, “writing the shown number”, “showing the stated number in the numerical table”, “stating the number of certain objects by counting”, “showing the amount of objects matching the stated number”, “matching the groups of objects with their numbers”, “sorting out the numbers”, “ﬁnding the missing number in rhythmic counting”, “stating the result of asked addition/subtract question”. Children receive 1 point for each ques-tion they answer correctly. The maximum possible score on this test is 88.

The geometric shapes sorting task consists of four subtasks: triangle sorting, rect-angle sorting, square sorting and circle sorting. The test includes a total of 48 items. Each subtask consists of 12 items, including one typical example, non-typical exam-ples and palpable and impalpable distracters. For instance, an equilateral triangle is a typical example on the triangle sorting task. Non-typical examples are triangles that differ in size, orientation, skewness and aspect ratio. Examples of palpable distracters are squares and circles, and impalpable distracters areﬁgures that are sim-ilar to triangles, but have incompatible side and corner characteristics. Children receive 1 point for each item they sort correctly. The maximum possible score on this test is 48.

KR-20 alpha values were calculated to test the reliability of the measurement tools. As seen in Table 2, the KR-20 value was .98 for the number and operation task and .86 for the geometric shapes sorting task. In order to test the validity of the measurement tools, expert opinions were obtained. Each scale is presented to 10 pre-school education experts and their approvals are obtained about the validity of each scale.

In addition, in order to test the validity of the number and operation task, and geometric shape sorting task, the validity of a similar scale was tested for the pur-pose of observing correlation between children’s test scores. It is found that there is a fairly high level of positive correlation between number and operation task and

Table 2. KR-20 alpha values for number and operation task and geometric shapes sorting task.

Mean number and operation task Geometric shapes sorting task

KR-20 value .98 .86

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geometric shape task scores (r = .823, p < .001). The results show that the measure-ment tools have the reliability and validity to be used in this research (Table3).

Data collection

Before collecting the data from the children who attended preschool, the required permissions were obtained from the administrators of the preschools in the study and from the parents of the children selected from these schools. The data were col-lected during interviews with the children conducted by the researchers in silent rooms in the schools. Before collecting the data from the children who did not attend preschool, the parents were contacted with the help of the local authorities and their consent was obtained for the study. The data were collected during inter-views with the children that were conducted by the researchers in an appropriate room in each child’s home. The number and operation task was conducted with the childrenﬁrst. The next day, the geometric shapes sorting task was conducted. Data analysis

An independent-samples t-test was applied to determine whether there was a signi ﬁ-cant difference between the groups in the children’s total scores on the number and operation task and the geometric shapes sorting task.

In this research, a stepwise regression method was also applied in order to deter-mine which independent variable (preschool attendance, age, gender, mother educa-tion, mother occupaeduca-tion, father education and father occupation) has a meaningful contribution to predicting the success in number and operation and geometric shape sorting.

Results

This section presents ﬁndings about the children’s achievements in number and operation and geometric shape sorting tasks. Table 4 shows the t-test results of the scores obtained by the children on the number and operation Task.

Table 3. Pearson correlation coefﬁcients between children’s scores on number and operation task and geometric shapes sorting task.

Geometric shapes sorting task Number and operation task Person correlation .823

Sig. (2-tailed) .001

N 200

Table 4. Mean number and operation scores for children who attend preschool and children who do not attend preschool.

Groups

Task Attend preschool Do not attend preschool t df d Number and operation 59.77 33.15 8.33** 198 .25

(23.05) (22.09) Note: Standard deviations appear in parentheses below the means. *p < .05; **p < .01.

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An independent-samples t-test was conducted to compare the scores on the number and operation task between the children who attend preschool and those who do not attend preschool. This test revealed a statistically signiﬁcant difference, t(198) = 8.33, p < .01. The effect size for this analysis (d = .26) exceeded Cohen’s (1988) threshold for a large effect (d = .14). These results indicate that the children who attended preschool had higher scores on the number and operation task (M = 59.77, SD = 23.05) than the children who did not attend preschool (M = 33.15, SD = 22.09).

We performed a stepwise regression analysis with number and operation achieve-ment as the dependent variable and preschool attendance, age, gender, mother’s edu-cation, mother’s occupation, father’s education and father’s occupation as the independent variables. As shown in Table5, most of the sociodemographic variables were found to play an insigniﬁcant role in explaining the dependent variable. On the contrary, preschool attendance and the child’s age signiﬁcantly explained 47% of the variance in geometric shapes sorting achievement (ΔR2 = .46) as measured by the geometric shapes sorting task.

Table 6 shows the t-test results for the scores that the children obtained on the geometric shapes sorting task according to the preschool attendance. The table shows that there is a statistically signiﬁcant difference between the scores obtained on the geometric shapes sorting task (t(198)= 10.99, p < .01, d = .38). The scores on

the geometric shapes sorting task were higher among the children who attended pre-school (M = 39.79, SD = 5.04) compared with the scores of the children who did not (M = 30.62, SD = 6.59).

Table 5. Predictors of number and operation achievement.

Variable

Number and operation achievement

Model 1 Model 2 B B 95%CI Constant 6.54 −71.456** [−90.88, 52.02] Preschool attendance 26.61** 26.45** [21.10, 31.80] Age 15.59** [12.10, 19.09] R2 .26 .47 F 69.45** 86.78** ΔR2 .46 ΔF 77.34**

Note: N = 200; CI = conﬁdence interval. *p < .05; **p < .01.

Table 6. Mean scores on the geometric shapes sorting task for children who attend pre-school and children who do not attend prepre-school.

Groups

Task Attend preschool Do not attend preschool t df d Geometric shapes sorting 39.79 30.62 10.99** 198 .38

(5.04) (6.59) Note: Standard deviations appear in parentheses below the means. *p < .05; **p < .01.

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We applied stepwise regression analysis with the geometric shape sorting achievement as the dependent variable and preschool attendance, age, gender, mother’s education, mother’s occupation, father’s education and father’s occupation as independent variables.

Table 7shows the results of the stepwise regression analysis. Most of the soci-odemographic variables were found to play an insigniﬁcant role in explaining the dependent variable. On the contrary, preschool attendance and the child’s age signiﬁ-cantly explained 41% of the variance in geometric shapes sorting achievement (ΔR2= .41), as measured by the geometric shapes sorting task.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to investigate the immediate impacts of preschool attendance on Turkish children’s mathematics achievement. The children who attended preschool demonstrated signiﬁcantly better performance on the number and operation task and the geometric shapes sorting task compared with the children who did not attend preschool. Given that the measurement tools used in this study measure learning outcomes in schools, it is not surprising that the children attending preschool were more successful in number operation and geometry.

The results of regression analysis also showed that preschool attendance is the most significant factor in children’s mathematics achievement. Age is a secondary predictor for children’s success in mathematics. Previous research has shown that age is an important factor for children’s mathematics achievement, and that as chil-dren get older, their success in number and operation tasks (Çepoğlu 1994; Geary and Thomas1996; Güven1997; Aktaş Arnas et al.2003) and geometric shape sort-ing tasks (Clements et al. 1999; Aslan and Aktaş Arnas2007) is increased. Gender and parents’ education level and occupation do not predict children’s success in mathematics. Similarly, previous studies have shown that gender does not make a significant difference in preschool children’s mathematics achievement (Güven 1997; Aktaş Arnas et al.2003; Majzub2012). On the other hand, thefindings of this study contradict with the previous studies that argue that parents’ socio-economic characteristics such as their education level and occupation are important factors for children’s mathematics achievement (Jordan, Huttenlocher, and Levine 1992;

Table 7. Predictors of geometric shapes sorting achievement.

Geometric shapes sorting achievement

Model 1 Model 2 B B 95%CI Constant 21.45** 12.13** [6.33, 17.94] Preschool attendance 9.17** 9.15** [7.55, 10.81] Age 1.86** [0.81, 2.90] R2 .38 .42 F 120.93** 70.10** ΔR2 _.41 ΔF 12.33**

Note: N = 200; CI = conﬁdence interval. *p < .05; **p < .01.

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Ginsburg and Pappas2004; Aslan, Aktaş Arnas, and Eti2012). However, this might be due to the lack of signiﬁcant difference between the education level and occupa-tion of the parents in both groups.

The findings of this study expand the findings of the studies that have claimed that preschool attendance has positive impacts on the mathematics achievement of children through preschool. In alignment with the findings of this study, Polat Unutkan (2007) determined that the current mathematics achievement of 5- to 6-year-old children who attended preschool is significantly higher compared with their peers who did not attend preschool. Similarly, Ömerciklioglu (2006) stated that preschool attendance has a positive effect on the current mathematics achievement of children ages 4–7: the children who attended preschool performed significantly better. Ginsburg, Lee, and Boyd (2008) stated that the differences in children’s math-ematics achievement may develop during the preschool period. Several researchers (Klibanoff et al.2006; Cross, Woods, and Schweingruber 2009) reported that these differences are related to the mathematical experiences that the children gain and inputs they receive during the preschool period. Campbell, Pungello, Miller-Johnson, Burchinal, and Ramey (2001) determined that the children who received full-time, high-quality preschool education from birth until the age of five demonstrate higher mathematics achievement than their peers, who did not receive preschool education but received the same food assistance and social services (cited in Klibanoff et al. 2006). Children who attend preschool have the opportunity to improve their mathematics skills with numerous activities, such as playing mathe-matics-related games under the guidance of their teacher or with their peers, playing with blocks, measuring, comparing, sorting, matching objects and making graphics (Clements and Sarama 2008; Aktaş Arnas2012). It is likely that all of these activi-ties have a positive effect on children’s mathematics performance.

The ﬁndings of this study are different from the results of studies that have claimed that preschool attendance does not have any effect (Maripatricia 1996; Pagani et al. 2004; Adams 2008; Conner2008; Nichols 2009) or even has a nega-tive effect (Chhinh 2003) on the mathematics achievement of children. The effects of preschool attendance on the mathematics achievement of children during elemen-tary school and beyond have been examined in the studies mentioned above. The effects of preschool attendance on children’s mathematics performance may decrease or disappear over time. Moreover, the differences in the ﬁndings might be derived from the variety in the quality of the preschool education programmes that children attend (Chhinh2003; Adams2008).

As a conclusion, the findings of this research show that preschool education has a significant impact on children’s math achievement, and children attending pre-school have higher math achievement than the children not attending prepre-school. The recent PISA results show that Turkish students are lagging far behind their peers in OECD countries in mathematics achievement (PISA 2012). Given the previous research demonstrating the significant impacts of preschool education on children’s later success in mathematics, it is important for Turkish children to benefit more from the preschool education.

Conclusion

This study has determined that preschool attendance is the most signiﬁcant variable affecting children’s mathematics achievement. Children who attend preschool

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demonstrate signiﬁcantly greater mathematics achievement than children who do not attend preschool. This result is important because mathematics achievement during the preschool years predicts future academic achievement (Wolfgang, Stannard, and Jones2001; Clements and Samara2007). Therefore, it is important to ensure that all children, especially disadvantaged children who come from low-income families, beneﬁt from high-quality preschool education.

This study is important because it is conducted with children who did attend pre-school and who did not, and itsﬁndings are obtained by reliable measurement tools. In addition, unlike most studies done retroactively on preschool children, this study is important in demonstrating the ﬁndings on children’s current age period. Yet it has some limitations. This study focused on preschool children’s skills related to numbers, operators and geometry. Future studies should also examine children’s achievements in other areas of mathematics. Furthermore, the sample in this study was comprised of children from low-income and middle-income families. Children from high-income families should be added in future studies. Finally, in future stud-ies, the impacts of preschool attendance beginning at an early age on children’s mathematical achievement should be longitudinally examined.

Notes on contributors

Durmuş Aslan ﬁnished his PhD at the Department of ECE in Çukurova University. His research interests are conceptual development and mathematics education in early childhood period.

Yaşare Aktaş Arnas is a professor at the Department of ECE in Çukurova University. Her research interests are math, science and drama in early childhood education.

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