This EAGER explores whether raising long-term mathematics, science and reading scores will require more emphasis on developing specific learning skills before school entry or in early schooling. Ongoing research shows that attention/executive function, fine motor skills, and general knowledge (early comprehension of the world) appear to be foundational to later cognitive development and performance and strong predictors of eighth grade mathematics, science, and reading scores. Additionally, results suggest that schools are not the cause of achievement gaps, rather, these gaps are present prior to kindergarten entry and, once they occur, schools are not able to close them. This EAGER examines whether the intriguing and counterintuitive suggestions from earlier results are more on target than present-day assumptions.
The purpose of the EAGER grant is to: (1) better understand cognitive development and later achievement; (2) explore early family environments and early schooling on achievement and achievement gaps; (3) structure policies to support higher achievement; (4) conduct cross discipline research; and, (5) bridge intellectual gaps between neuroscience and classrooms.
This EAGER promotes potentially transformative research in early stages of new areas of research; it is high risk but with a potentially high payoff in mathematics, science, and reading education. This EAGER takes on radically different approaches through a highly competent team of experts (e.g., developmental psychologists, scientists, neuroscientist, behavioral geneticist, developmental and cognitive neuroscientists, public policy experts, economist, and STEM educators) with novel interdisciplinary perspectives.
Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE The purpose of this grant was to promote and enhance potentially transformative research stemming from our earlier NSF grant focused on understanding the evolution from early childhood of math achievement gaps for children at socio-demographic risk. That interdisciplinary work produced findings that were counterintuitive, and potentially transformative in (1) understanding early cognitive development and its relationship to later achievement, (2) structuring early family environments and interventions in out of school time and early schooling to close achievement gaps, and, (3) structuring early education and social policies to support interventions in out of school time. Much of the effort to improve later achievement in math has been driven by an implicit assumption that raising later math achievement is the cumulative effect of efforts to start math instruction earlier, spend additional time on math and math remediation and improve the quality of math instruction in all previous grades. This assumption drives both educational policy and associated R&D policy in this country, and has resulted in a narrower curriculum from spending more time on math and reading and less time on other subjects, much more emphasis on direct math instruction in kindergarten and pre-school and improving the quality of teachers of math.However, these policies have not significantly reduced national achievement gaps. A second assumption in our educational policy is that achievement score gaps between minority/disadvantaged students and advantaged non-minority students (socio-demographically children) is primarily the result of differential quality of schooling. Over the last 25 years, almost all of the within state funding disparities and differences in key measures like class size and teacher salaries that existed for children at socio-demographic risk have been closed. States have also increased per-pupil spending significantly and developed standards based accountability systems based on annual testing. Despite this substantial school reform, there has been no sustained or systematic reduction in score gaps for children at socio-demographic risk within states over the last 25 years. No Child Left Behind also provided explicit incentives for closing achievement gaps for children at socio-demographic risk in schools throughout the nation. Despite these efforts at school reform, national achievement gaps have shown almost no sustained narrowing over the last 25 years with the exception of very limited narrowing for 4th grade math. A third assumption in our educational policies is that poor U.S. performance in international scores is primarily due to differential quality of schools. The tendency has been to look for systemic problems that assume that nearly all U.S. schools need improvement to raise international scores. These systemic school problems have included the lack of incentives in public schooling, poor text books and pedagogy, low and differential state standards and differences in the recruitment, preparation and salaries of public school teachers, as well as the subsequent difficulty of firing poor quality teachers, which results in differential quality internationally in teachers. Many historical and ongoing policies attempt to partially address these issues in areas like school choice, charter schools, state standards combined with testing, use of value added approaches to teacher compensation, setting uniform state standards and addressing teacher tenure issues. All these policies continue to assume that schools are the primary problem. However, a significant cause of international score gaps arises from the achievement gaps for the much larger proportion of children at socio-demographic risk in the U.S., and school reform has not been effective in significantly reducing this gap. The funding in this grant partially supported research that suggested our long term math achievement gaps have their origin in deficits in at least three early cognitive skills that are present prior to school entry, but are strong predictors of 8th grade math scores. Three early skills that strongly predict later math are executive function, visuo-spatial and early comprehension. These skills are not primarily formed in school based direct instruction. Rather these skills are developed in play-based and other out of school activities, and children at socio-demographic risk have substantial deficits in these skills at school entry arising partly from the more limited opportunity to build these skills in their environments prior to school entry and in out of school time once in school. Reducing long term achievement gaps and international gaps may require closing deficits in these skills prior to school entry or in early grades for children at socio-demographic risk through changing both educational and social policies that help provide opportunities to build these skills . This grant partially supported the research underlying these findings, and provided direct support to disseminate these finding through professional conferences, presentations at meeting supported by NSF, presentations in academic seminars and in drafting articles for professional journals. The funding also supported a post-doctoral fellow who attended professional neuroscience meeting and courses in research methodology associated with experimental testing of hypotheses arising from our research.
