Parents vary substantially in the frequency and complexity of the math support that they provide to their children, and this variability is often related to their children's math knowledge. We hypothesized that parents' knowledge about the development of two critical early math topics would help explain some of this variability in their early math support. U.S. parents of 3- and 4-year-olds (N = 196 mothers and 148 fathers, 94% identified as the child's primary caregiver and 77% as White; 79% had at least a bachelor's degree) reported on their knowledge about the development of early numeracy and repeating patterning skills, numeracy and repeating patterning beliefs related to their children, numeracy and repeating patterning support, and education, income, and employment status via a survey. Parents’ knowledge about early repeating patterning development was positively related to all the measured child-specific repeating patterning beliefs and both were predictive of the frequency and complexity of their reported repeating patterning support. Their knowledge about early numeracy development was also positively related to most of their child-specific numeracy beliefs, but while their child-specific numeracy beliefs uniquely predicted their reported numeracy support, their knowledge did not. Parents’ knowledge about early numeracy and repeating patterning development was not consistently related to their education, income, nor employment status, but their education and employment status uniquely predicted their numeracy and repeating patterning support. Implications of these findings for research, theory, and parent-based interventions are discussed.

父母为孩子提供数学支持的频率和复杂程度差异很大，这种差异通常与孩子的数学知识有关。我们假设，父母对两个关键的早期数学主题的发展的了解将有助于解释他们早期数学支持中的一些变化。美国 3 岁和 4 岁孩子的父母（N = 196 名母亲和 148 名父亲，94% 被认为是孩子的主要照顾者，77% 是白人；79% 至少拥有学士学位）报告了他们对这一发展的了解通过调查了解早期算术和重复模式技能、与孩子相关的算术和重复模式信念、算术和重复模式支持以及教育、收入和就业状况。父母对早期重复模式发展的了解与所有测量的儿童特定重复模式信念呈正相关，并且两者都可以预测他们报告的重复模式支持的频率和复杂性。他们对早期算术发展的了解也与大多数儿童特定的算术信念呈正相关，但是虽然他们的儿童特定的算术信念独特地预测了他们报告的算术支持，但他们的知识却没有。父母对早期算术和重复模式发展的了解并不总是与他们的教育、收入或就业状况相关，但他们的教育和就业状况独特地预测了他们的算术和重复模式支持。讨论了这些发现对研究、理论和基于家长的干预措施的影响。