Intertextuality and the advance of mathematisation in young children's inscriptions

A fundamental question in early childhood mathematics con-cerns the relationship between young children’s own informal signs and the formal abstract symbolic language of mathe-matics. This study presents research investigating the genesis of mathematical semiosis from a Vygotskian cultural-historical (social-semiotic) perspective. In this study we look at the pre-mature stages of dealing with quantity and their relationships. Our aim is to reveal the interweaving of young children’s sign- use and to consider the role of intertextuality in mathematisa-tion. Longitudinal, ethnographic data were gathered from case studies of seven children aged 3–4 years in an inner-city nursery school in England, documenting observations of their sponta-neous pretend play. The data are interrogated through inter-pretive analysis and show that some graphical signs moved between individuals’ texts, also borrowed from others including the teacher, and woven together. Children’s progressive under-standings of mathematical sign-use appear to be attained in part through intertextual exchanges in social and culturally meaningful contexts, such as pretend play.