Prof. Minna Hannula-Sormunen

Speaker's Biography

Prof. Minna Hannula-Sormunen in a professor of education, and the leader of Research Group for Mathematics Teaching and Learning at the Department of Teacher Education in University of Turku, Finland. Her professorship is focused on early mathematical development and how to support it. Prof. Hannula-Sormunen’s research covers mathematical, linguistic and motivational aspects of learning and learning environments from toddlers to adulthood, particularly in early and primary education. Research methods cover experimental, longitudinal follow-up and intervention studies. She has been developing several intervention programs and preschool materials for early and primary education, as well as online and in-person courses for pre- and inservice teacher training. Currently she is the leader of Finland’s largest inservice training for mathematics teaching from early to secondary education. Prof. Hannula-Sormunen loves winter swimming in ice cold waters, cute dogs and she wants to make the world a better place for all children.

Title of Keynote

Let’s put math glasses on in early education

Abstract of Keynote

The research shows that within a child’s mathematical competence, it is possible to distinguish separate attentional processes that trigger self-initiated use of specific mathematical recognition skills in non-mathematical situations (Hannula & Lehtinen, 2005). Thus, for some children the world may appear to be full of numerosities, numerically ordered sets of items, quantitative relations and other mathematical aspects, which open up opportunities for practicing early mathematical skills, while some others rather focus on other non-mathematical features of the environment and involve themselves much less with mathematical ideas. Intervention studies demonstrate potential of supporting children’s spontaneous focusing on numerosity at preschool (e.g., Hannula-Sormunen et al., 2020). How to use these findings in developing professional vision and expertise of early educators? The presentation will describe the journey from the first research findings of spontaneous focusing on numerosity (SFON) to the current state of art in pre- and inservice teacher training and early math education in Finland in respect to practical implications of these research findings.