What Does Algebra Look Like in Early Childhood?

How can educators encourage and better prepare students to pursue science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)-based fields? To start, students are more likely to pursue these fields if they enjoy and perceive themselves to be good at them. This means introducing relevant concepts and skills at an early age and embedding them throughout the entire pre-K-12 school experience. But can algebra, a unifying thread of almost all of mathematics, be taught to 3- and 4-year-olds? Although such an idea may seem far-fetched and unfeasible to many early childhood educators, this is exactly what Joohi Lee, Denise Collins, and Janet Melton propose. By breaking down algebra into its basic concepts—patterns, symbols, and relationships between concrete materials—they show how even the youngest children can begin to grasp concepts of concrete algebra and algebraic reasoning, significantly increasing their odds of success in other courses later on and in life.