THE EMERGENCE OF ORDER AND CLASS ASPECTS OF NUMBER IN CHILDREN: SOME FINDINGS FROM A LONGITUDINAL STUDY

Summary. The development of children's understanding of the two logical properties of number—class and relation—is subject to debate (Piaget 1952; Brainerd, 1973, 1979). The study was designed to contribute to this debate by exploring the relative acquisition of “number as class” and “number as order”. This was one of several issues examined in a longitudinal study of the development of the understanding of number emerging in a group of 36 children during the first three years of primary school. A battery of Piagetian and neo-Piagetian tests was individually administered during each of the three years, together with a test of number skills. The study used operationally-defined concepts of “number as order” and “number as class”. Trends over the three cycles were analysed. For numbers less than six and small arrays of numbers, order and class were both in evidence. However, as numbers became larger and more numerous, ordination was in evidence sooner than cardination.