The Research

Learning in young children is socially mediated. Families, peers, and teachers are all
important. Even basic perceptual learning mechanisms such as the statistical learning of
linguistic sounds require direct social interaction to be effective. This limits the benefits
of educational approaches such as e-learning in the early years.

Learning by the brain depends on the development of multi-sensory networks of
neurons distributed across the entire brain. For example, a concept in science may
depend on neurons being simultaneously active in visual, spatial, memory, deductive, and kinesthetic regions, in both brain hemispheres. Ideas such as left-brain/right-brain
learning, or unisensory ‘learning styles’ (visual, auditory, or kinesthetic) are not
supported by the brain science of learning.

The importance of executive function skills in mathematical achievement is well established, and
research conducted in the last decade has witnessed a move from a focus on just measuring
working memory or updating to an inclusion of other EF skills, namely inhibition and shifting.
We review findings from studies that have taken different approaches to measuring EF (e.g.,
using single versus multiple indicators), and which apply different analytical techniques to
conceptualize EF structure (e.g., exploratory versus confirmatory techniques). The consistent
finding that emerges despite these differences is that updating is a significant, often unique,
predictor of math achievement across a wide age range, whilst the findings relating to inhibition
and switching are less conclusive. We discuss these findings in relation to age-related variance
in EF structure, the nature of inhibitory and shifting task requirements, and the possibility that
updating is a limiting factor or a common resource for inhibition and shifting.

This review of the literature on self-control and delay of gratification behavior spans educational research, cognitive theory, and behavioral experiments as a deeper exploration of the delay of gratification paradigm in the larger context of society’s goal of improving the social and academic performance of its members. The body of literature ultimately suggests five things: first, that children’s academic success is in some ways predicated on pre-academic skills such as social orientation; second, that these pre-academic skills are themselves predicated on selfcontrol; third, that the cognitive and developmental theories of self-control are correlated with delay of gratification behavior; and fourth and finally, that delay of gratification behavior can be improved through environmental changes and behavior training. Future research directions, in light of the myriad threads of research discussed, are presented.

This study examined the psychometric properties and criterion validity of a newly developed battery of executive function (EF) tasks for use in early childhood. The battery was included in the Family Life Project (FLP), a prospective longitudinal study of families who were oversampled from low-income and African American families at the birth of a new child. Ninety-nine percent of children who participated in the age 5 home visit completed 1 or more of the 6 tasks. Results indicated that tasks worked equally well for children residing in low-income and not low-income homes, that task scores were most informative about the ability level of children in the low-average range, that performance on EF tasks was best characterized by a single factor, and that individual differences on the EF battery were strongly related to a latent variable measuring overall academic achievement, as well as to individual standardized tests that measured phonological awareness, letter–word identification, and early math skills.

We analyze the effect of substituting a weekly mathematics lessons in primary school grades 1-3 with a lesson in mathematics based on chess instruction. We use data from the City of Aarhus in Denmark, combining test score data with a comprehensive data base from administrative register. We use a difference-in-differences approach to investigate treatment effects on the treated and tend to find positive effects. Looking at sub groups, we find significant positive effects for native Danish children, while we find no effects for children of immigrants.

Chess is thought to be a game demanding high cognitive abilities to be played well. Although many studies proved the link between mastery in chess and high degree of intelligence, just few studies proved that chess practice can enhance cognitive abilities. Starting from these considerations, the main purpose of the present research was to investigate the potential benefits of in-presence chess lessons and on-line training on mathematical problem-solving ability in young pupils (8 to 11 years old). Five hundred sixty students were divided into two groups, experimental (which had chess course and on-line training) and control (which had normal school activities), and tested on their mathematical and chess abilities. Results show a strong correlation between chess and math scores, and a higher improvement in math in the experimental group compared with the control group. These results foster the hypothesis that even a short-time practice of chess in children can be a useful tool to enhance their mathematical abilities.