What are the key counting principles to helping young students learn?
The 5 Counting Principles
Generally, research agrees that there are 5 principles that children follow when learning how to count. These principles can be divided into two parts:
- How to count – These principles explain the rules and methods that children should follow when they count. These include the One-To-One Principle, the Stable Order Principle, and the Cardinal Principle.
- What to count – These principles explain what children can count. They include the Abstraction Principle and the Order Irrelevance Principle.
1. The One-To-One Principle
This describes the necessity to count each item in a group only once. When we count, we assign one distinct name to each number. Children need a lot of practice doing this, because they have a tendency to:
- Skim – Children may count too quickly and miss out an object.
- Flurry – Children may count an object more than once.
2. The Stable Order Principle
This is the idea that the names of numbers should be said in the correct order, and that the order of those numbers will not change.
The difficulty with this is that the names of numbers in the English language don’t always have a pattern. This is the case specifically for the numbers between 10 and 19, which don’t have the same pattern as the numbers between 1 and 9, 20 and 29 or 30 and 39, and so on.
Children often learn how to recite names of numbers from quite a young age, without really understanding the quantities that numbers represent until they are around 4 years old.
Children need to learn the correct names of numbers so that they can then count correctly. Essentially, by understanding that the names of numbers have a correct order, children can understand that numbers also have a progressive value.
3. The Cardinal Principle
This is the understanding that the final number said when counting tells you how many objects are in that group.
Research suggests that children develop a sense of cardinality for different numbers at different stages. They first understand the cardinal meaning of the number 1 and believe that all other numbers are simply “bigger than one”.
4. The Abstraction Principle
This is idea that we count everything in the same way, no matter what it is. Anything can be counted, from physical things to things that can’t be touched.
Research has shown that children find it easier to count tangible objects compared to abstract concepts.
5. The Order Irrelevance Principle
This is the understanding that the order in which objects in a group are counted is not important. The number order does not change just because the counting order does. However, this principle only rings true if all the other principles are followed.
Subitising
Understanding the 5 counting principles is key to understanding numerosity, which is the ability to perceive the number of items in a group. Sometimes, numerosity happens consciously, such as with counting. But other times, numerosity happens unconsciously, such as with subitising.
Subitising is the ability to accurately determine numerosity without having to consciously count. For example, we are able to determine the numbers on one face of a dice without having to actively count the dots.
Subitising itself is not a counting principle. Instead, a child’s ability to subitise is a measure of how well they understand the 5 counting principles, and numerosity as a concept.
Final thoughts
Counting is an essential life skill that children sometimes struggle to grasp. Using these five principles can help provide a range of activities that can help them learn more effectively and more efficiently. A child’s ability to subitise is a great indicator of how much they understand the 5 counting principles, numbers and their meanings.
