Early number knowledge and skills

This chapter focuses specifically on young children’s early number knowledge and skills and on why it is essential that early childhood educators and caregivers provide children with a numeracy-enriched learning environment. It also focuses on children’s awareness and recognition of quantity, their gradual understanding of the relations between quantities and how symbols are used to represent quantities, and their ability to use numbers and number words across a range of contexts. In this way, the chapter demonstrates children’s intuitive sense of number yet also acknowledge the complexity that children gradually overcome when acquiring number knowledge and skills. Importantly, it describes the many facets of number knowledge that emerge throughout the early years. Finally, it addresses the importance of individuals’ perception of their own numerical abilities beginning in early childhood.