Investigation of the effect of the mathematics education program supported with stories on the mathematics skills of 48-60 month old children

The aim of this study is to develop a story-supported mathematics education program for six-year-old children attending kindergarten and to examine the effect of this program on early mathematics skills. The study group of the research consists of pre-school children studying at an independent kindergarten under the Ministry of National Education in Uşak in the 2020-2021 academic year. The study was conducted with 33 children in total, including 18 children in the experimental group and 15 children in the control group. In this research, pretest-posttest, quasi-experimental design with control group was used. In addition, the observations of the students during the application process of the education program supported by the stories to be applied by the students during the application process were analyzed by descriptive analysis technique. Early Mathematical Ability Test-3 (TEMA-3) was used to collect data in the study. Adaptation, validity and reliability study of the test developed by Ginsburg and Baroody for 48-60 month old children in Turkey made by Şeker(2013). In the data collection process, the Early Mathematics Ability Test-3 (TEMA-3) was administered as a pre-test before the mathematics education program supported by stories was applied to the experimental and control group students. After the pre-tests were over, the Mathematics Education Program Supported by Stories was applied for 8 weeks, once a week, with the experimental group. During the research process, the Early Mathematical Ability Test-3 (TEMA-3) applications were applied to the children in the experimental group by the researcher; the daily education flow specified in the 2013 Pre-School Education Program was continued for the children in the control group. The data obtained from the research were analyzed with the SPSS 22 program. Independent groups T-Test was used to see if there was a significant difference between the pre-test and post-test scores, and the dependent groups T-Test was used to see if there was a significant difference between the pre-test-post-test scores of the experimental and control groups. Based on the findings obtained from the analyzes, there was no significant difference between the pre-test scores; It was found that there was a significant difference between the post-test scores in favor of the experimental group. It has been concluded that the mathematics education program supported by stories is effective in improving children's mathematics skills. Keywords: Early Childhood, Early Mathematics Ability, Mathematics Education