A solid foundation in math is important for children's long-term academic success. Many factors influence children's math learning--including the math content students are taught in school, the quality of their instruction, and the math attitudes of students' teachers. Using a large and diverse sample of first-grade students (n = 551), we…

This study is focused on the relational thinking of first-grade students following their first 3 months of instruction from the Measure Up (MU) curriculum, an adaptation of the El'konin-Davydov curriculum. Following Davydov's outline of instructional material, the MU first-grade materials were designed to have students identify the quantitative…

Fractions are a challenging mathematics topic for many elementary and middle school students, and even for adults. However, a growing body of developmental research suggests that young children can reason about visually presented proportions, well before fraction instruction, providing insight into how fractions might be introduced to improve…

Purpose: We conducted a randomized control trial of an instructional program, SRSD Plus, which integrates reading for writing to inform, writing, oral language, spelling and handwriting for students in Grades 1 and 2. Method: A total of 10 teachers and their 248 students in Grade 1 (n = 121) and Grade 2 (n = 127) in the southwestern part of the US…

Mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) for teachers can improve classroom interactions, teacher mindfulness, and well-being, yet whether teacher focused MBIs also benefit children remains largely unexplored. This cluster randomized trial with 36 urban elementary schools, 224 K-5th grade teachers (M[subscript age] = 41.5) and 5200 children…

Small-group instruction has the potential to support students' reading growth. Teachers can use knowledge of students' skill profiles to inform the types and amounts of instruction they provide; however, the extent to which teachers do this is largely unknown. Among first (n = 661) and third graders (n = 364), we investigated whether (1) teacher…

The aim of this study was to examine if--and to what extent--a sensory modality's conceptual congruency influences learning in digital environments. Building on previous work in multimedia and embodied learning, the study used custom software to systematically vary the conceptual congruency of two sensory modalities (aural and bodily-kinesthetic).…

This study utilized a partially nested randomized control design to investigate the impact of Fusion, a first-grade math intervention. Blocking on classrooms, students were randomly assigned to one of the three conditions: a Fusion two-student group, a Fusion five student group, or a no-treatment control group. Two primary research questions were…

School adjustment is an important factor in children's, and research attributes an important role to the quality of the teacher-student relationship in predicting more favourable school adjustment. The purpose of this study is to expand our knowledge of the relationship between teacher-student relationship quality and school adjustment (academic…

Understanding how children demonstrate creativity assists educators in designing learning experiences that foster this key competency. Frameworks such as the "A-E of Children's Creativity" assist in the analysis of children's creativity, presenting their creative thinking characteristics as five connected processes: agency, being…

This mixed-method study examined the balance of narrative and informational text instruction in alignment with Common Core State Standards (CCSS), and teachers' professional learning opportunities in elementary classrooms. Surveys were sent to teachers in one midwestern state, and audio recordings of literacy instruction were collected in one…

We present the results from an exploratory study that aimed to measure teachers' specialized knowledge in early mathematics during a pilot of an educational intervention using the Foundational Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching (FMKT) survey. The survey was administered to 323 teachers in the Kyrgyz Republic in 2021. We delve into survey results…

In this paper, we explore the following research questions: How do first-grade students define even and odd numbers? What types of justifications do they use to support their generalizations using these definitions? We report the ways in which first-grade students define even and odd numbers and how they justify generalizations that use their…

Colors in the learning environment are likely to affect students' memory. In addition, each individual's interest and attitude towards colors change over time under the influence of different factors. Thus, this very question arises "what is the relationship between color preferences and effects of colors on memory on students' learning in…

Students need to create mental models for different types of addition and subtraction situations in order to develop a broad and viable understanding of these operations. Although most students succeed when changing or combining sets, situations that demand a quantitative comparison of sets seem considerably more difficult in the first school…