Investigating volume estimation performance and strategies of 6th-Grade children and adults

Abstract

The present study aimed to examine children’s and adults’ performance and strategies in volume estimations. Three tasks were designed and presented to 40 adults and 40 6th grade children who were asked to estimate: (a) the number of unit measures (bricks/rice spoons) that may be put in a container, (b) the quantity of bricks/rice, between two different quantities of bricks/rice, that could fit in a container, and (c) the container, between two containers, that may hold a quantity given. Participants were – randomly and in equal numbers from each age group – assigned to four groups differing in their opportunity for trial condition and the presence of the half reference point in the containers. Although the majority of participants showed quite low performance rates in estimating volume, their estimations were more successful when the trial condition was available to them as well as when the trials referred to small containers and discrete quantities. The mental counting strategy was mainly used by both age groups. Adults, however, often used the algorithm and processed precise volume measurement. These results are further discussed in relation to educational implications as well as to the perspective of early supporting children’s abilities for estimations at the primary school.

KEYWORDS:

• Measurement estimation
• volume estimation
• reference points

Acknowledgements

The present study was carried out for a master's dissertation conducted by Dimitropoulos P. at the University of Western Macedonia under the supervision of Dr. Desli D. The authors would like to thank the anonymous referees for their thorough review of our paper for improving this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.