Patterns before numbers: why repeating patterns matter for early maths

EduTrend Contents · G4C Cognitive · Evidence: Emerging

Red, blue, red, blue... what comes next? Spotting and extending patterns looks like a simple nursery activity. Research suggests it is connected to how children's maths develops.

Maths is full of patterns: counting by twos, the repeating 0-9 in every decade, times tables, shapes that tessellate. Before children meet numbers on paper, they can already practise the underlying skill of finding a rule that repeats.

What the research says

Researchers at Vanderbilt University, led by Bethany Rittle-Johnson, have studied patterning in young children for several years. In one study of 65 children, those who were better at repeating patterns at the end of pre-kindergarten knew more maths at the end of kindergarten, including counting to 100. This link held even after the researchers took into account children's working memory and their earlier maths knowledge.

This is correlational evidence: it shows patterning and maths go together, not yet that pattern games cause better maths. Intervention studies are still limited, so we rate the evidence as Emerging. But pattern activities are cheap, enjoyable and fit naturally into play.

From copying to understanding

Children move through stages:

• Copy a pattern exactly.

• Extend it: what comes next?

• Fill a gap in the middle.

• Rebuild the same pattern with different things, for example turning button, pasta, button, pasta into clap, stamp, clap, stamp.

The last step is the important one. A child who can rebuild a pattern with new materials has understood the rule, not just the objects.

Try this tomorrow. Make a train of objects in an AB pattern (spoon, fork, spoon, fork). Ask the child to continue it, then to make the same pattern with sounds or movements. When that is easy, try ABB (spoon, fork, fork).

Related resource: G4C-110 Thinking Games includes five pattern and logic games, from Pattern Train for 5-year-olds to Code Breaker for 11-year-olds. Coming soon to EduStore; subscribe to the newsletter to hear when it opens.

Sources / Further reading

• Zippert, E. L., Douglas, A.-A., & Rittle-Johnson, B. (2020). Finding patterns in objects and numbers: Repeating patterning in pre-K predicts kindergarten mathematics knowledge. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. Link

• Rittle-Johnson, B., Zippert, E. L., & Boice, K. L. (2019). The roles of patterning and spatial skills in early mathematics development. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 46, 166-178. Link