Effects of using picture books in mathematics teaching and learning: A systematic literature review from 2000–2022

Abstract

Using picture books in teaching is a popular trend in early childhood education. However, little attention has been paid to such pedagogy in mathematics learning. For this article, we reviewed 16 empirical studies from the past two decades (2000–2022) regarding the use of picture books in mathematics instruction, in order to investigate their effects on mathematics learning in students. We analyse and critically assess approaches used to integrate picture books into mathematics instruction, the overall effects of such integration on the mathematical performance of students, and the factors that inhibit or enhance these effects. The findings of our review reveal that most of the selected studies targeted early mathematics education, with only a minority addressing secondary education. Various approaches are available for the integration of picture books into mathematics teaching, having various positive effects on student attitudes toward mathematics, as well as their academic performance and mathematical representation ability. The reported inhibiting factors for teachers using picture books in teaching included a lack of pedagogical knowledge and confidence, time constraints, resource constraints and doubts regarding the expected outcomes. Conversely, the enhancing factors included early educational stage (especially the pre‐school level), perceived pedagogical benefits, desire to improve teaching and enabling social norms. Suggestions for future research focused on the integration of picture books into classroom teaching are also discussed.

The Use of Literary Elements in Teaching Mathematics: A Bibliometric Analysis

“…When the frequencies of the keywords are examined, it is noticed that the studies on the subject still focus on the early childhood period and children's books. This is in line with the findings of Edelman et al (2019), Zhang et al (2023). Gökçe and Güner (2021) stated that as a result of their comprehensive bibliometric review on the field of mathematics education, one of the most repeated terms is early childhood.…”

“…This situation draws attention to the need for studies at advanced grade levels and different fields not only for children's literary elements and mathematics teaching but also for all mathematics education subjects in the literature. So, research examining the use of literary elements in mathematics education, especially at different educational levels in middle school school and beyond, still points to an important research gap on the subject (Zhang et al, 2023). Because, in the literature, it is noted that very few of the studies on the subject are conducted experimentally, while the studies are mostly carried out at the early childhood level (Clarissa et al, 2021;Edelman et al, 2019).…”

“…So, some researchers conducted these kinds of studies to see the landscape of using literary elements in education and mathematics. For example, Zhang et al (2023) aimed to examine the experimental studies on the subject, they investigated the articles published between 2000-2022. They included the studies which are indexed in EBSCO, Education Research Complete, JSTOR and Springer.…”