Explore the evidence
9 of 88 decisions · clear everything
Growth-mindset interventions change beliefs almost everywhere and change achievement almost nowhere: the two independent national-scale trials measured standardized tests and found exactly zero.
mixedconf: highgc: lowDoes teaching a growth mindset raise achievement? · character · ages 4–18
Mastery learning moves tests of what it taught (~0.25) and barely moves independent measures (~0.05) — and time-to-mastery gaps widen, converting ability differences into time.
mixedconf: highgc: lowMastery learning (teach → test → reteach to criterion → advance) · mastery · ages 6–18 · method
Most measured 'home environment' effects are parents' genes: three-quarters of parent-child transmission isn't rearing, and a whole better childhood buys ~4 IQ points.
mixedconf: highgc: lowThe early home environment — what parents can and cannot causally move · early-childhood · ages 4–10 · input
Teaching coding teaches coding: the one clean school RCT gives g=0.47-0.68. Which approach you pick barely matters, and almost every effect size rests on an instrument the developers built.
moderate supportconf: mediumgc: lowDoes teaching programming actually teach programming — and does the method matter? · computer-science · ages 5–18
Manipulatives help when bland, guided, and aged ~7–11 — a guided-representation effect, not 'hands-on learning.' Rich, toy-like objects hurt transfer.
moderate supportconf: mediumgc: lowManipulatives and concrete-representational-abstract (CRA) sequences · math · ages 5–14
Correcting a real deficiency moves cognition (iron in anaemic children: 0.79 SD); supplementing already-fed children moves nothing (35 RCTs, 19,343 children).
mixedconf: mediumgc: lowBreakfast, school meals, and micronutrients — what feeding children actually buys · health · ages 4–18 · input
A missed day costs little (~0.005 SD); interventions reliably buy days back cheaply, but nobody has shown the recovered days move achievement.
mixedconf: mediumgc: mediumChronic absenteeism — does raising attendance raise achievement? · time · ages 4–18 · input
Attainment falls steadily with age of first exposure, but the sharp critical period is contested and an earlier classroom start buys nothing durable: start young for immersion, not for two lessons a week.
mixedconf: mediumgc: mediumIs there a critical period for learning a second language, and when should a child start? · foreign-language · ages 4–18
What parents are asked to DO is the whole effect: tutoring a skill d≈1.15, listening to reading 0.51, reading aloud ~0.18 — same parent, same child. All deflate under better designs.
mixedconf: mediumgc: mediumThe parent as instructor — what survives when the person teaching is the person who raised the child · homeschool · ages 4–18 · method
- Does arts education raise academic achievement?
- Does learning to code improve general thinking?
- Can executive function be trained, and does it transfer to learning?
- Physical activity as an input — dose, fitness, and school outcomes
- Does teaching grammar improve children's writing?
- Does teaching movement transfer to cognition, achievement, or lifelong activity?
- Teaching students to think scientifically — does it transfer?
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