Comparison of The Effectiveness of the Educational Package of Cognitive-Metacognitive Strategies and Cognitive Intervention in Solving the Mathematical Verbal Problem and Cognitive Functions in Students with Special Math Learning Disabilities

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the educational package of cognitive-metacognitive strategies and cognitive intervention in solving the mathematical verbal problem and cognitive functions in students with special math learning disabilities. The design of the present study was a pretest-posttest with a control group. The statistical population of the study consisted of all fourth grade elementary students with special learning disabilities in Bahmaei city, Iran in 2020. From this population, 16 people were selected as the research sample by purposive sampling. The training package was presented in the form of 9 sessions of 45 minutes. Content validation was used to validate the training package. The research instruments were a researcher-made questionnaire for solving mathematical verbal problem, Wechsler scale index version 5 and Key Math scale. Research hypotheses were tested by repeated measures analysis of variance. The results indicated that the educational package and cognitive intervention could significantly increase cognitive functions and mathematical verbal problem solving in students with special math learning disabilities (p < .01). Comparison of means of post-test and follow-up in the variables of mathematical verbal problem solving (MD = 0.31, p < .52,), planning (MD = 0.13, p = .99), concurrent processing (MD = 0.38, p <0.49) and sequence processing (MD = 0.25, p <0.12) showed that there was no significant change in dependent variables after two months. Explaining this result, it can be said that the training package has been effective in the long time. On the other hand, teaching cognitive-metacognitive strategies compared to cognitive intervention had a greater effect on the variables of mathematical verbal problem solving (t = 3.12, p < .01) and simultaneous processing (t = 3.22, p <.01). Accordingly, the teaching of cognitive-metacognitive strategies can be used to improve cognitive functions and verbal problem solving in students with special math learning disabilities.