Ethan and Eli, almost five years old, take turns counting approximately 40 seeds. If we watch the details of their actions, we see a number of cases where they give two number words to the same seed and sometimes skip a number word, e.g. saying 28 after saying 26. Both boys say a number word each time they point, but not necessarily the next word in the number sequence and not necessarily one word per seed. Can we say the boys are being careless or that they are carefully applying their incomplete knowledge?

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