This study focuses on a serious game as a tool to enhance the development of number sense in Kindergarten children: The Number Sense Game. The game is constructed to trigger children’s curiosity and, consequently, facilitate learning. In the game, both educational goals and game play are balanced to engage players and achieve an effective learning outcome. The Number Sense Game evokes sensory curiosity (physical factors, e.g. light changes, attract attention) and cognitive curiosity (desire to bring better form into one's knowledge structure; Malone, 1980). Following an embodied perspective, children’s exploration of their physical environment is essential for learning, including number sense. This study will examine whether a virtual world can replace that physical world.
The main goal of the game is to enhance the mapping between symbolic and non-symbolic skills (cf. Kolkman et al., 2012). Within symbolic skills, a distinction can be made between verbal and visual numerical processing (‘three’ vs ‘3’) and within non-symbolic skills a distinction can be made between numbers of objects (dots, toys, etc.) and continuous scales (number line, length). In the game, children are triggered to make connections between these various representations of number. The game is presented on a tablet. During the experiment, the children will play the game twice weekly during four weeks. The poster is meant to provide more detailed information about the game, and to present the first results of the pilotstudies conducted with 30 children, aged five or six years old.

• dr. Femke Kirschner