AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE COMPUTATION AND CONSERVATION PERFORMANCE OF LEARNING DISABLED AND NONDISABLED CHILDREN IN SECOND GRAD

This study was designed to examine the computational and conservation skills of LD and ND children. Also of interest was the existence of relationships between the two variables.;The descriptive design utilized 30 LD and 30 ND second grade subjects of normal intelligence from suburban New Jersey schools.;Stimulus materials for the calculation task included 24 addition and subtraction sentences which included 16 open sentences. The Conservation Assessment Kit - Conservation, Form A (Goldschmid & Bentler, 1968) served as the conservation materials.;Subjects were individually presented with the calculation and conservation tasks in a counterbalanced order. The examiner read each of the calculations aloud during random presentation to the subjects. Children had manipulative materials available for solution and were asked to describe their strategy during or after their calculation attempt. Following accurate solution of each problem, the subjects were directed to provide alternate strategic justifications. Conservation judgements were measured in six areas. Following a correct judgement, the subjects were asked to rationalize their judgement using as many explanations as possible.;Results of statistical analyses pointed to superior calculation and conservation performance by the ND subjects. The differences in performance were most evident with regard to the generally higher numbers of ND students who could provide correct justifications for correct answers to the computations and appropriate explanations for accurate conservation judgements. Relationships between the two variables were moderately high when conservation performance was correlated with strategy utilization. No significant relationships were discovered between conservation judgement and calculation accuracy.;The implications of the present study call for studies which investigate older children's performance on more difficult and varied tasks in arithmetic and cognitive functioning. Should such studies provide confirmation of the present investigation, instructional techniques using more generalized, structured and sequential problem solving options may improve the performance of LD students.