{"id":1405,"date":"2026-08-30T22:53:57","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T12:53:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/?p=1405"},"modified":"2026-08-30T22:53:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T12:53:57","slug":"cvc2026-702","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/cvc2026-702\/","title":{"rendered":"CVC2026-702 \u2013 Understanding the mental number line of children with Down syndrome"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"cvc-hero alignfull\">\n  <span class=\"cvc-chip\">Presentation \u2013 CVC2026-702<\/span>\n<\/div>\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-left\">Understanding the mental number line of children with Down syndrome<\/h1>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\n<div class=\"cvc-authors\">\n<p><strong>Thi Hong Dung Phan, <\/strong>University of Queensland, Australia<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rhonda Faragher,<\/strong> University of Queensland, Australia<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\n<div class=\"ast-oembed-container \" style=\"height: 100%;\"><iframe title=\"CVC2026-702 Understanding the mental number line of children with Down syndrome\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/vblolaJosXo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\n<p><strong>Background: <\/strong>Children with Down syndrome experience difficulties in learning mathematics, particularly in counting, discriminating quantities, and basic arithmetic. However, the sources of these difficulties remain a mystery. One possible factor may be the mental number line (MNL), our internal representation of numerical magnitude along a spatial continuum. The MNL underlies number sense, an ability to understand, represent, compare, and manipulate numerical quantities, which strongly relates to mathematics learning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Aim: <\/strong>While the MNL has been widely studied in typically developing populations, little is known about how children with Down syndrome mentally represent numbers. This narrative literature review aims to synthesise existing research on the MNL in children with Down syndrome, examine methods used in these studies, and identify factors that may influence its development \u2013 age, educational experiences, general mathematics development, and cognitive and visual-spatial abilities. It also seeks to identify gaps and implications for future research and mathematics teaching.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Method\/approach:<\/strong> A literature search was conducted using ERIC, PsycINFO, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. Search terms included \u201cmental number line\u201d, \u201cnumber line estimation\u201d, \u201cnumerical magnitude representation\u201d, \u201cnumerical estimation\u201d, \u201cspatial numerical association\u201d, \u201cspatial-numerical mapping\u201d or \u201cspatial numerical representation\u201d, and \u201cDown syndrome\u201d. Peer-reviewed studies written in English were included.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Results\/findings: <\/strong>Only three studies have examined the MNL in children with Down syndrome, all using number-to-position tasks. These studies found children with Down syndrome performed similarly to typically developing children matched on mental-age. However, findings are inconsistent regarding types of spatial-numerical representations used and their relationships with early numeracy skills and visuospatial abilities. Moreover, the absence of position-to-number tasks may limit understanding the MNL in this population, and other factors such as educational experiences, school and home mathematics activities, remain underexplored.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Conclusion: <\/strong>The review highlights significant gaps in knowledge of the spatial-numerical representations of children with Down syndrome and needs for further research. A better understanding of the MNL may contribute to numerical cognition theories and inform effective mathematics instruction and interventions for these children.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Implications for children and families: <\/strong>It will provide effective activities for parents supporting their children learning mathematics at home and help children gain confidence in learning numbers.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Implications for practitioners:<\/strong> It will be helpful for teachers in designing lessons or interventions and use effective strategies that best support their development.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Keywords<\/strong><strong>:<\/strong> mental number line, children with Down syndrome, spatial-numerical mapping<\/p>\n<p><strong>This presentation relates to the following <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/sdgs.un.org\/goals\"><strong>United Nations Sustainable Development Goals:<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<ul class=\"cvc-sdgs\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/sdgs.un.org\/goals\/goal4\">SDG 4: Quality Education<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thi Hong Dung Phan, University of Queensland, Australia; Rhonda Faragher, University of Queensland, Australia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,51,1],"tags":[46],"class_list":["post-1405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-childrens-inclusion","category-childrens-learning-and-activities","category-presentations","tag-sdg-04"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1405"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1484,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1405\/revisions\/1484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childrensvoicesconference.csu.domains\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}