A comparison of consructivist and traditional education methods in enabling 6 years old pre-school children to acquire skill in some mathematical concepts

A comparison between the effectiveness of constructivist and traditional education methods in enabling six-year-old pre-school children from lower social economic standards to acquire skills in some mathematical concepts has constituted the objective of this study. In that regard, a comparative study has been conducted to figure out which method is more effective in the acquisition of these skills by providing a group of six-year-old children of the town of Mamak, from lower social economic standards, with the education of geometrical shapes and numerals concepts via employing both constructivist and traditional education methods. A total of 60 children in preparatory class from four primary schools, each of which has contributed 15 children, have participated in the study. Of the children, 30 of them are boys, and 30 girls. On the one hand, "A Personal Information Form" has been employed to gain information on the children and their parents; on the other hand, "A Form for the Concept of Geometrical Shapes" and "Piaget's Conservation of Numerals Test" has been applied to shed light on the extent of knowledge of shapes and numerals. While the experiment groups have been provided, using both constructivist and traditional education methods, with the education for literacy and with the teaching of games, geometrical shapes and numerical concepts by means of educational toys activities, the control group has not been given any education whatsoever. The above- mentioned "A Form for the Concept of Geometrical Shapes" and "Piaget's Conservation of Numerals Tesf'have been applied as a pre and post test at the beginning and at the end of the education period. As a result, it has been determined that there has been a greater increase in the geometrical shapes and Piaget's Conservation of Numerals Test scores of children who have been subjected to the constructivist education method than in those of children who have been in the control groups and exposed to the traditional one. It has finally been concluded that in the preparations for literacy, the children who have received the education through the constructivist education method have been more successful than those who have acquired the education by virtue of traditional education method.