Explore the evidence
14 of 88 decisions · clear everything
Survives the gold standardIndependent, durable, rigorousThe debunked shelfCheap winsFor parents at homeFamous numbers, deflatedWhere we admit ignoranceThe terrain
domain
survival prior
Your situation · from the applicability layer — absence means “not yet assessed,” never “doesn’t apply”
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: low18/1831/48connected:FadeoutSystematic/explicit phonics vs whoTalent and trainabilityAre self-control and grit teachabl
Does 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: low6/615/48connected:Does educational technology raise Retrieval practice (the testing efPlacement and mastery diagnosis
Mastery learning (teach → test → reteach to criterion → advance) · mastery · ages 6–18 · method
Should a school buy a social and emotional learning programme? · character · ages 4–18
Executive function trains like a task, not like a capacity: gains are real, narrow, and gone at follow-up, EF curricula are null under independent trial, and the latent construct is ~100% heritable.
no effectconf: highgc: low21/2148/48connected:Does working-memory or brain trainHow should a school run its classrFadeoutTalent and trainability
Can executive function be trained, and does it transfer to learning? · character · ages 4–18
Brain training improves the trained task and nothing else: far transfer to intelligence or achievement is 0.001 against active controls.
no effectconf: highgc: low18/1827/48connected:FadeoutTalent and trainabilityDoes learning to code improve geneCan executive function be trained,+1
Does working-memory or brain training transfer to intelligence and achievement? · transfer · ages 4–18 · debunked
Matching instruction to 'learning styles' does nothing: real matching experiments return d=.04. The correlational literature IS the myth.
debunkedconf: highgc: lowDoes matching instruction to a child's "learning style" improve learning? · debunked · ages 4–18 · debunked
Life-skills courses reliably teach the content and rarely change the conduct; behaviour moves only where instruction sits close in time to the decision, and driver education is worse than nothing.
mixedconf: mediumgc: low11/1148/48
Do life-skills courses — money, cooking, driving, health — change what students actually do? · practical · ages 6–18
Sort by what the software replaces: adaptive drill inside the school day buys +0.05-0.20 SD; a device, a connection or the teacher buys zero to negative; LLM tutors have no usable evidence at all.
mixedconf: mediumgc: low53/5339/48connected:Placement and mastery diagnosisMastery learning (teach → test → rTutoringClass-size reduction
Does educational technology raise learning — CAI, adaptive software, devices, screens, and AI tutors? · edtech · ages 5–18 · structure
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: medium14/1424/48
Is there a critical period for learning a second language, and when should a child start? · foreign-language · ages 4–18
Coaching buys ~0.25 SD of score and has for 42 years — a fraction of what's advertised — and none of it is ability. The score moves; the construct doesn't.
mixedconf: mediumgc: medium20/2036/48
Test preparation — does coaching raise scores, and does a raised score mean raised ability? · assessment · ages 5–18 · structure
Trust the composite; distrust the breakdown. Subtest strengths-and-weaknesses replicate at chance on retest, and most of what people read off a score report is noise.
mixedconf: mediumgc: low21/2124/48
What a standardized achievement score does and does not license · assessment · ages 5–18 · structure
Coding instruction teaches coding (d≈0.68) and not thinking: against active controls far transfer is g=0.15, two validated-instrument RCTs found d≈0.00, and a 46-school maths trial found −0.16 to −0.21.
no effectconf: mediumgc: lowDoes learning to code improve general thinking? · transfer · ages 5–16
Narrow reasoning routines are teachable and stay taught for seven months. The far-transfer claim failed its one randomised test: science −0.01, English −0.15, maths −0.11.
no effectconf: mediumgc: lowTeaching students to think scientifically — does it transfer? · science · ages 7–18
Brain Gym, Fast ForWord, coloured overlays, the Mozart effect: tested and failed, or never evidence-based at all. Mozart works exactly as well as any other music.
debunkedconf: mediumgc: low11/1120/48connected:Does teaching visual art produce aDoes matching instruction to a chiDoes working-memory or brain trainDoes learning music make children
Brain Gym, Whole Brain Teaching, and the smaller classroom brain fads · debunked · ages 4–18 · debunked
Not yet assessed for this question · 42
- Acceleration and gifted programs — the label vs the content
- Algebra timing — acceleration mandates, delay mandates, and readiness-based placement
- Are museum and theatre trips worth the day out of school?
- Does teaching visual art produce artistic skill?
- Chronic absenteeism — does raising attendance raise achievement?
- Background knowledge and vocabulary as drivers of reading comprehension
- Class-size reduction
- Comprehensible input or explicit grammar teaching — which builds a second language?
- Curriculum choice as a school-level lever
- Explicit vs reform/constructivist math instruction
- Feedback and formative assessment
- Grade retention — holding a child back versus promoting, and test-based promotion policies
- Ability grouping and tracking — four practices, four verdicts
- The early home environment — what parents can and cannot causally move
- Homeschool socialisation — the most-asked question, and the least answerable one
- Length of the school day and year, time-on-task, extended time, and summer
- Interleaving (mixing problem types vs blocking)
- Does dual-language immersion work, and is the gain in the second language or in English?
- Manipulatives and concrete-representational-abstract (CRA) sequences
- Math curriculum choice — how much does the textbook matter?
- Feedback frequency and mental practice in motor learning
- Practice scheduling for motor skills — varied vs blocked, spaced vs massed
- Should Gardner's multiple intelligences be used as a basis for instruction?
- Breakfast, school meals, and micronutrients — what feeding children actually buys
- Phonemic awareness training (and whether it needs letters)
- Placement and mastery diagnosis — deciding what to teach next from evidence of current skill
- Preschool at scale — Head Start, state pre-K, and what universal provision delivers
- Perry Preschool and Abecedarian — what the famous studies actually establish
- Reading-comprehension strategy instruction (reciprocal teaching, summarizing, questioning)
- Reading fluency — guided repeated oral reading, and whether repetition matters
- Reading Recovery and Tier-2 1:1 early-literacy tutoring
- School spending, charters, and what school-level choices actually move outcomes
- School starting age, relative age, and academic redshirting
- Inquiry-based science teaching vs explicit and textbook science teaching
- Science misconceptions and conceptual change — can naive intuitions be taught away?
- Does sentence combining improve writing?
- Do later school start times increase adolescent sleep, and does that raise achievement?
- Teacher quality — selection over credentials and workshops
- Vision — outdoor time against myopia, and screening and correction for achievement
- Word problems, schema instruction, and the conceptual-vs-procedural question
- Does strategy instruction (SRSD, the writing process) improve writing?
- Early sport specialization, talent selection, and the relative age effect
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