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Running head: MINDSETS AND BRAINOLOGY® 1 Mindsets and Brainology®: Self-Theories of Intelligence and an Intervention Kathryn W. Boehm EG5103: Data-Driven Learning Culture Lipscomb University October 18, 2010

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Page 1: Mindsets and Brainology

Running head: MINDSETS AND BRAINOLOGY® 1

Mindsets and Brainology®:

Self-Theories of Intelligence and an Intervention

Kathryn W. Boehm

EG5103: Data-Driven Learning Culture

Lipscomb University

October 18, 2010

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Chapter 1

Introduction

At the outset, I must credit Vanderbilt University Professor Dr. Tamra Stambaugh for

introducing me to the work of Dr. Carol S. Dweck. Dr. Stambaugh’s primary research field is

gifted education and the effect of accelerated curriculum, with a focus on low-income students

(Vanderbilt University, n.d.). Although I will be studying the effect of mindset on the low-

achieving student, T. Stambaugh told me that a fixed mindset can be just as detrimental to the

gifted child as it is to the low-performing student (personal communication, June 13, 2010).

Dweck is a Stanford University professor of Psychology who has studied self-theories of

learning since the early 1980’s. Her more recent work supports a statistically significant

connection between the student’s self-theory of intelligence, or mindset, and academic

achievement. In “Implicit Theories of Intelligence Predict Achievement across an Adolescent

Transition: A Longitudinal Study and an Intervention,” Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck

(2007) demonstrate that an incremental theory, or growth mindset, in seventh grade students

predicts an upward trend in academic achievement over the course of seventh and eighth grade.

This result is compelling, but it begs the question: Can mindset be changed to create conditions

which are conducive to success? These same researchers also focused on two groups of low-

achieving seventh-graders in New York City. A time-consuming, eight-week intervention was

undertaken with these students. The experimental group was taught that their brains can get

stronger, like a muscle. The experimental group showed marked improvement in mathematics

achievement.

As the No Child Left Behind Program Specialist in an urban charter school, I find the

results of Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck’s 2007 study intriguing and encouraging. The

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purpose of this current study is to replicate the 2007 study, but I will take advantage of Dweck’s

web-based software program Brainology® (n.d.), which provides both a questionnaire to

measure each student’s self-theory of intelligence and an intervention to develop a growth

mindset. Using the software will render the intervention engaging and enjoyable for the students,

and it will make the research process manageable not only for me, but also for other practitioners

who might wish to employ the same intervention. I shall address the following two questions:

1) Do the seventh graders at my school have a growth mindset or do they view intelligence as

immutable and innate?

2) Would completing the software program Brainology® (n.d.) result in statistically

significant gains in seventh grade math scores on Discovery Education Assessments at my

school, as compared to seventh-graders at a demographically similar school?

My hope is that Brainology® (n.d.) may afford teachers in other schools with a predominantly

low socio-economic status (SES), low-performing student body an elegant and powerful

intervention to encourage a growth mindset and produce more learners who are willing to accept

academic challenges and risks in order to learn more. Such students will be more resilient

academically and, thus, more successful learners. Obtaining a quality education is the most direct

road out of poverty, yet many of our low-SES students fail to complete their educations. If

simply possessing a growth mindset leads to higher academic achievement and if changing the

mindsets of students into growth mindsets can be accomplished by the proposed intervention of

utilizing Brainology® (n.d.), then we will possess a powerful approach to narrowing the

achievement gap which can feasibly be implemented in any school.

Search procedures

I had already identified a particular study to replicate, so I used search terms related to

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the topics addressed in Black, Trzesniewski, and Dweck’s 2007 study, which was my main

primary source. I employed an ERIC keyword search first, looking for articles on middle school

students, mathematics achievement, low-income students, self-theories of intelligence,

attribution theory, and achievement gap. Searching on any one of the above keywords yielded so

many articles that I used the logical “AND” connector to combine search terms in various ways

and narrow the results. The articles I found were written between the mid-1970s and the present.

The search results helped me to understand the development of attribution theory of intelligence

as a research topic. C. S. Dweck’s name came up frequently both in my ERIC search and in the

reference sections of the articles I found. I utilized ERIC to search for the author name Dweck,

and I found 35 articles either authored or co-authored by C. S. Dweck between 1975 and the

present. Through reading all of the abstracts for those articles, I was able to trace Dweck’s

progression as a researcher from 1975 to the present. She is clearly a well-known, frequently

cited expert in her field. This phase of my research helped me to place my questions in the

educational research tradition and to understand Dweck’s place in that tradition.

During that search, I found Dweck’s publication, Self-theories: Their Role in Motivation,

Personality, and Development (2000). This collection of essays is not only readable but also

well-researched. The chapter entitled “Is Intelligence Fixed or Changeable? Students’ Theories

about Their Intelligence Foster Their Achievement Goals” was particularly useful to me in

understanding the development of Dweck’s ideas. Black, Trzesniewski, and Dweck’s 2007

study flows naturally out of the research cited in this particular essay. I searched the reference

section of the 2007 study in order to determine which of those references might be useful to me.

These sources ranged in date from 1961 to 2006. It was through this process that I identified J.

Aronson as a key researcher, and I was able to locate a study on racial stereo-typing to which

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Aronson contributed (Aronson, Cohen, McColskey, Montrosse, Lewis, & Mooney, 2009). My

greatest struggle was finding full-text publications of Dweck’s work, and I discovered rather late

in the process that Dweck’s Stanford University webpage lists numerous articles with full-text

links and complete publication information. I availed myself of that resource as well.

The professional publications Educational Leadership (ASCD) and Mathematics

Teaching in the Middle School (NCTM) are available online, and I searched for articles on those

websites as well. The Jensen book, Teaching with Poverty in Mind (2009), was recommended by

a colleague, and I found a wealth of useful information in that book. I felt it essential to define

what “achievement gap” means, and there is no better source for that than the U. S. Department

of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (2010). I have a Brainology®

subscription, and so I was able to experience the software myself and access the entire website. I

used additional internet resources to obtain statistics and facts necessary to back up or explicate

my claims.

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Chapter 2

Review of Literature

Self-Theories of Intelligence, or Mindsets

As stated above, my proposed research is based on Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and

Dweck’s 2007 study; therefore, I reviewed the reference section of that article. I scanned the

abstracts of numerous research pieces which preceded the 2007 study. I noted the use of the

terms “learned helplessness vs. mastery,” “learning goals vs. mastery goals,” and “entity theorist

vs. incremental theorist.” There has been an evolution of terminology, and so I take this

opportunity to make a few definitions. According to Dweck, each student has an implicit theory,

or self-theory, of intelligence. That is, we each have an underlying notion of the nature of our

own intelligence. This notion is the self-theory of intelligence. There are two essential types of

self-theory of intelligence. A student who holds an entity theory of intelligence believes that

intelligence is a fixed quantity and that each person possesses a given amount of intelligence. An

incremental theory of intelligence reflects the belief that intelligence is changeable and that a

person can become more intelligent through effort, concentration, experience and other factors

(Dweck, 2000). Dweck now refers to an entity theory of intelligence as a fixed mindset and an

incremental theory as a growth mindset (2009). In this paper, entity theory and fixed mindset will

be used interchangeably, as will incremental theory and growth mindset.

The Middle School Student

Prior to 1963, junior high school was exactly like high school, except with younger

students. There was no concept that the young adolescent’s developmental and academic needs

might differ in quality from those of the high school student. The middle school movement in the

U.S. began in 1963 with a landmark address by William Alexander of George Peabody College,

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and the number of middle schools in the U.S. has exploded since that time. In 1970, there were

2,080 middle schools; there were 10,944 in 1998 and nearly 12,000 by 2002 (Armstrong, 2006).

Alexander recognized the need for middle schools which would address the developmental needs

of the young adolescent. According to Armstrong:

Educators need to understand the developmental needs of young adolescents, and in

particular their neurological, social, emotional, and metacognitive growth. Some of these

developmental needs are ignored or subverted by inappropriate educational practices such

as fragmented curricula, large impersonal schools, and lesson plans that lack vitality.

Practices at the best schools honor the developmental uniqueness of young adolescents,

including the provision of a safe school environment, student-initiated learning, student

roles in decision making, and strong adult role models. (Armstrong, 2006, p. 113)

In our current educational environment, with the strong emphasis on standards and test scores,

we run the risk of removing student-initiative from the learning process. Middle school students

who have little input into the learning process and who are viewed as mere receivers of

knowledge disengage from their own learning, disown the process, and seek stimulation outside

of the school walls.

All young adolescents experience the awkwardness of impending puberty, exploding

cognitive development, increasing self-consciousness and emotional unevenness, yet minority

students carry the additional burden of negative racial stereotypes (Aronson, Cohen, McColskey,

Montrosse, Lewis, & Mooney, 2009). These students may attribute their natural academic

struggles to these stereotypes. These researchers have concrete recommendations for mitigating

the negative effects of stereotypes. First, teach and emphasize that intelligence grows stronger

like a muscle. Greater effort will result in greater intellectual growth. Also, explain to children

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that their difficulties are the result of a normal learning curve, not attributable to the student or

the student’s racial group. Finally, assist students in identifying values outside of school which

contribute positively to the individual’s self-esteem (Aronson, et al., 2009). The study of racial

stereotyping supports Dweck’s call for developing a growth mindset. Such a mindset not only

improves academic achievement, but it is also an antidote for racial or gender stereotyping

(Dweck, 2006).

There are informal ways to encourage a growth mindset and tap into students’ individual

strengths. One useful technique is to draw a parallel between school work and students’

extracurricular activities. Students frequently believe that practice and effort will lead to

improvement in sports, music, or art but not in academics. Pointing out this dichotomy to

students and referring to homework as “practice” and the teacher as “academic coach” may

encourage a growth mindset (Atwood, 2010).

Middle school children strive for competence in all areas of their lives, and, although

their growth is naturally uneven, they want to be trusted and given responsibilities whenever

appropriate. They also need support and a sense of safety in case they fail to meet expectations.

The developmental changes which occur during middle school can enhance the learning process

when educators possess a deep understanding of the middle school child. The difficulties

inherent in middle school education become opportunities for growth.

The Achievement Gap in Mathematics

Before undertaking this research, we must examine and define the so-called achievement

gap. There is a well-documented achievement gap in standardized test scores, not only between

white students and students of color, but also between students in low-poverty schools vs.

students in high-poverty schools. According to The Condition of Education: 2000-2010 (U. S.

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Department of Education, 2010), an internet publication of the United States Department of

Education (USDOE) National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), in 2009 white eighth-

graders scored an average of 32 points higher than their black counterparts on the National

Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), despite the fact that both groups showed

improvement over the previous year. This achievement gap has existed at least since 1992

(USDOE, 2009). NCES reports that in 2005 the average fourth-grade score on the mathematics

NAEP assessment was 221 for students in schools with greater than 75% free or reduced lunch

and 255 for schools in which the free or reduced lunch rate was less than 10% (USDOE, 2009).

Regardless of whether we consider the achievement gap between racial groups or consider the

SES of our students, there is clearly a gap in achievement. We must address this problem in the

interest of equity, opportunity and social justice.

Not only is there an achievement gap in mathematics scores on the NAEP, but the U.S.

also lags behind other developing nations on the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study,

particularly in the area of measurement. Middle school students are not exposed to enough

hands-on measurement activities and classroom experiences which require higher-order thinking

skills or which integrate measurement in math and science (Thompson & Preston, 2004).

Eric Jensen delineates the effects of poverty on brain development in both the emotional

and intellectual realms. He describes the practical difficulties that low-SES parents have. For

example, they may have to work multiple jobs or long hours, and so they don’t have adequate

time to spend with their children. The parents are often stressed or even depressed, and, thus, not

emotionally available to their children. It is common for parents to work nights, for example, and

for children in fifth grade or younger to get up on their own, dress for school, lock the house, and

walk to the bus stop or to school. The children themselves don’t develop a full range of

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emotions, and the children may live in dangerous neighborhoods or difficult home situations

which overdevelop the amygdala and make the children overly emotional. Meanwhile, the other

areas of the brain, such as the visual cortex, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, and occipital lobe, don’t

develop as many neurological connections as the brains of higher-SES children. Thus, lower-

SES children experience diminished cognitive capacity. In response to this bleak outlook for

student outcomes, however, Jensen proposes that schools foster an “enrichment mind-set”:

Your school will get results only when you and your staff shift your collective mind-set

from “those poor kids” to “our gifted kids.” Stop thinking remediation and start thinking

enrichment. The enrichment mind-set means fostering intellectual curiosity, emotional

engagement, and social bonding….Essentially, the enrichment mind-set means

maximizing students’ and staff members’ potential, whatever it takes. Whether or not

students choose to go to college, enrichment programs prepare them to succeed in life.

(Jensen, 2009, p. 94)

This enrichment mind-set is a classroom and school-wide approach designed to create a learning

environment which will mitigate the effects of poverty and accelerate student learning.

Considering that Jensen does not cite Dweck, I conclude that he defines “mind-set” differently

than she; rather, he is concerned with students’ attitudes, academic capacities, and thought-

processes about school.

How Does Mindset Affect Learning and Achievement?

In 1981, Dweck, Bandura and Leggett embarked on a series of studies regarding self-

theories of intelligence. The framing question was: Why do students become so focused on

grades? Students were asked to agree or disagree with statements such as “Your intelligence is

something about you that you can’t change very much;” “you can learn new things but you can’t

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really change your basic intelligence;” and “you have a certain amount of intelligence and you

can’t really do much to change it” (Dweck, 2000, p. 21). Students were classified as either entity

theorists or incremental theorists based on their responses. Later, students were given three

choices: one activity which was described as so simple that students probably wouldn’t make

mistakes, the second was described as a bit harder but a chance to demonstrate intelligence, and

the third was described as “hard, new, and different—you might get confused and make

mistakes, but you might learn something new and useful” (Dweck, 2000, p. 21).

In the study with eighth graders, over 80% of the entity theorists chose one of the first

two tasks, and 50% chose the easier task. That is, only 20% of the entity theorists chose the

learning-oriented, more challenging task. On the other hand, 60% of the incremental theorists

chose the more difficult, learning-goal task. This type of result was consistent over multiple

studies, ranging from fifth and sixth graders to college students to English-language learners in

Hong Kong (Dweck, 2000). Dweck has performed or reviewed multiple studies which indicate

that a student’s self-theory of intelligence is deeply and integrally related to the student’s

learning goals, motivation and willingness to take on academic challenges.

Having determined that there is a relationship between mindset and learning goals,

Dweck moved on to exploring the connection between mindset and achievement. In 2007,

Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck undertook a research project involving two studies. In the

first study (Study 1), the sample was 373 seventh grade students, in four cohort waves, who were

all enrolled in public schools in the New York City area. The sample was diverse racially and

economically, and it was gender-balanced. These students standardized test scores were

moderately high, at about the 75th percentile on average, and 53% of the students were eligible

for free or reduced lunch (FRL). At the beginning of seventh grade, each student was given a

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questionnaire in order to determine the individual’s mindset, as well as other information about

student motivation and effort. Self-theory of intelligence was measured using a six-point scale

with a score of 1 representing a pure entity theorist and 6 indicating a pure incremental theorist.

The mean score was 4.45, and the standard deviation was 0.97. The students’ sixth grade math

achievement scores were available to the researchers as a baseline measure. The measure of

mathematics achievement was student grades at the end of the fall and the spring semesters

during seventh and eighth grade. Thus, Dweck and her colleagues obtained data for four waves,

or cohorts, of seventh graders over the course of two years each. A statistical analysis was

undertaken in order to determine the academic growth trajectories of the incremental theorists

and the entity theorists. The

results are best represented in

graphical form, as seen in Figure 1.

Note: Adapted from Implicit theories of intelligence predict achievement across an adolescent transition: A longitudinal study and an intervention, in Child Development, 78(1), Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007, p. 251

Intervention and Results

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The second phase of the 2007 study (Study 2) addressed the following hypothesis:

If the different theories of intelligence are indeed associated with contrasting

motivational patterns, then teaching students to think of their intelligence as malleable

should cause them to display more positive motivation in the classroom, and in turn to

achieve more highly. (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007, p. 253)

The sample in Study 2 was markedly different from the sample in Study 1. There were 91

seventh grade students who completed the study, all enrolled in a public school in New York

City, which was a different school than the school in Study 1. The sample was gender-balanced

and racially diverse; however, this group was low-achieving, with sixth-grade math achievement

scores at the 35th national percentile. The school’s FRL percentage was 79%, as compared to

53% for the school in Study 1. As in Study 2, students were given a six-point questionnaire to

determine self-theory of intelligence with, again, a score of 1 indicating a perfect entity theorist

and 6 a perfect incremental theorist. After the initial assessment, the students were divided into

experimental (N = 48) and control groups (N = 43). Sixteen research assistants were assigned to

perform an eight-week intervention, holding workshops during a time normally reserved for

students to receive extra help. The experimental group and control group both received four

sessions on brain structure, study skills, and the negative results of stereotyping. The

experimental group also had four sessions entitled “You Can Grow Your Intelligence,” “Neural

Network Maze,” “Learning Makes You Smarter,” and “labels should be avoided;” whereas, the

control group had lessons on mnemonic devices, “academic difficulties and successes,” and

“memory and the brain” (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007, p. 255).

Post-intervention analysis was in-depth and statistically thorough. Students were re-

assessed three weeks later to measure self-theory of intelligence. They were also given an

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assessment over the content of the intervention lessons. Although students’ scores over the

general workshop content didn’t vary significantly—73.0% for the experimental group and

70.5% for the control group, students in the experimental group, as expected, scored significantly

higher—83.5% vs. 53.9%—on items which covered the “incremental theory intervention

content” (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007, p. 256). The researchers also measured the

effect of the intervention on students’ self-theories of intelligence. For the experimental group,

there was a statistically significant increase in the mean score for self-theory—4.36 to 4.95;

whereas, the control group’s scores were 4.62 pre-intervention and 4.68 post-intervention, not a

statistically significant change (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007).

The most startling result is readily seen in the following graph (Figure 3) of mathematics

achievement. The intervention occurred between the second and third points on the graph, and

the measure was students’ mathematics grades.

Note: Adapted from Implicit theories of intelligence predict achievement across an adolescent transition: A longitudinal study and an intervention, in Child Development, 78(1), Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007, p. 257.

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We clearly see the abrupt upward trajectory in student math achievement after the intervention

(Blackwell, Trzesniewski, and Dweck, 2007). Study 2, however, did not have the longitudinal

aspect of Study 1, and it would be instructive to follow these students for a longer time. On the

other hand, given the results of Study 1, it is reasonable to hypothesize that students in Study 2

who were incremental theorists post-intervention would continue to follow a positive

achievement trajectory.

The results of this study are encouraging and impressive; however, there are drawbacks

inherent in this type of intervention—time and resources. Sixteen research assistants were trained

to implement the intervention workshops. Granted, the intervention appears to have been

successful, but what school or school system has resources to implement such a program?

Finances, time issues and lack of teacher buy-in would stop the program before it could begin.

Brainology®: Both a measure and an intervention

Dweck and her associates have developed a web-based software program called

Brainology® (n.d.), which not only measures the student’s mindset, but it also provides the

incremental theory intervention in an engaging, colorful, quest-oriented series of four computer

sessions. The teacher has the ability to track each student’s progress throughout the program;

thus, a researcher could use this as a tool to determine mindset and perform an incremental

theory intervention; then, he or she could track student test data in order to measure the effect of

the intervention.

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Chapter 3

Methods

Design

Given that this study involves an intervention which I expect to enhance student

achievement, it is unethical for me to offer the intervention to some of my students and not to

others; therefore, the proposed study will follow a quasi-experimental design. The experimental

group will be all seventh grade students, given that the students have parental consent, at my

charter school in Nashville, TN. The control group will be the seventh grade students at another

charter school in Nashville.

Charter schools legislation varies widely from state to state, and so it is worthwhile to

discuss briefly what constitutes a charter school in Tennessee. According to the Tennessee State

Board of Education website (n.d.), Tennessee Charter Schools are authorized by the Local

Education Authority (LEA), sponsored by a non-profit group or agency, and funded on the same

per-pupil basis as all other public schools in Tennessee. In addition, charter schools are granted

greater flexibility of curricular, instructional and organizational frameworks than traditional

public schools in exchange for great accountability. For example, a traditional public school can

fail to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for up to six consecutive years before being in

danger of School Restructuring and TNDOE takeover; whereas, a charter school which fails to

make AYP for two consecutive years can be lawfully closed. In addition to innovation and

greater accountability, charter schools are designed to provide parents with greater school choice

and to re-engage parents in their children’s educations (TN State Board of Education, n.d.).

There are four eligibility criteria for charter school admission in Tennessee, and these

tend to create schools with low-performing, low-SES students, at least at the outset. The charter

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school applicant must meet at least one of the following criteria:

1) The student has been previously enrolled in a charter school.

2) The student is zoned to a school which has failed to meet AYP for more than two

consecutive years. (High Priority School)

3) The student has failed to reach the level of proficient or advanced on either the Math or

Reading section of the Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP) in the

preceding year.

4) The student is eligible for FRL (TN State Board of Education, n.d.).

Students who meet the above criteria are, by definition, low-performing or of low-SES.

Sample

All seventh graders from two Nashville, TN charter schools will be invited to participate.

This study includes an intervention, and all seventh grade students from my school will get this

intervention, while students from the other school will not. The two schools should have similar

demographics, by virtue of the fact that they are both charter schools, and I will obtain

information sufficient to disaggregate data by gender, ethnicity, SES, exceptional education, and

limited English proficiency wherever disaggregation is useful or informative. I will control for

demographics as needed. The other participating school will agree to give me anonymous data

by randomly assigned student number. I will have complete access to my students’ data, but I

will maintain anonymity in the final report.

Measures

Students in Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) take three district-funded,

standardized TCAP-predictor tests called Discovery Education Assessments (DEA). My baseline

measure of achievement will be DEA A, which is given in late August or early September each

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year. I will utilize DEA B and C, given in November and February respectively, to determine the

effects of my intervention. The DEA Math section has a median reliability of 0.82 with a median

sample size of 30,390, the test is criterion referenced, and it has content validity. In addition, the

test utilizes a vertical scale which incorporates a proprietary growth formula, so that the

assessments get harder as the year goes on (DEA, 2010). This eliminates the need to control for

maturation and student learning.

What is Brainology®, and How Does It Work?

The Brainology® intervention will take place between Discovery Assessments A and B,

during our afterschool tutoring and test-preparation time. Only students who complete the web-

based software program Brainology® (n.d.) will be included in the results. When a student

begins the program, he or she answers six questions which give the participant a score on a six-

point Likert scale. This score indicates what sort of mindset the student has at the outset. The

student then progresses through a series of four brain challenges, posed by the “Brain Orb,” with

the help of two teenaged cartoon characters, Chris and Dahlia. The software covers a variety of

topics, including the structure of the brain, the process of learning and remembering, breathing

techniques to relieve test anxiety, and applying this knowledge to improve study skills. In

addition, the students have the opportunity to reflect on what they’ve learned by utilizing an

online journal (Brainology®, n.d.). The Brainology® (n.d.) questionnaire will also be given after

the students complete the intervention. I will analyze the results of the Brainology® (n.d.)

questionnaire in order to determine whether or not the intervention affects student mindsets to a

statistically significant degree. I will utilize two-variable descriptive statistics to determine the

impact of Brainology® (n.d.) on DEA scores. I will collect TCAP scores and 8th grade DEA

scores for all students in the sample, if feasible, in order to determine if the impact of the

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intervention has long-term results. I will interview students and teachers in order to collect their

thoughts and anecdotes after the Brainology® (n.d.) intervention.

Hopes and Dreams

Equity in education is the civil rights issue of our generation. Regardless of strides which

have been made in many areas of our society, many children, “the least of these,” suffer the

burden of poverty and fail to connect with our education system. Both the black-white and high-

poverty-low poverty achievement gaps are evident in elementary school and middle school

(USDOE, 2010). For the approximately 27.4% of Metropolitan Nashville Public School’s

students who fail to complete high school (MNPS, 2010), the gap grows into a chasm. When

students fail in school, they risk failing in life. I have been convinced for my entire professional

life that everyone can learn if they want to learn. Dweck’s work is the first research I’ve read

which addresses the self-theories of intelligence and offers a promising, direct interventional

strategy for my student population, an underserved group of young people who deserve the same

chance as every other group of American children.

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References

Armstrong, T. (2006). Best schools: How human development research should inform

educational practice. Alexandria, VA: ASCD. Retrieved from

http://books.google.com/books?

id=bmsbReA56NIC&printsec=frontcover&dq=armstrong+best+schools&source=bl&ots

=KQhOHdEpuW&sig=cMfHjAIN48yBtNitKPyDjc5twUc&hl=en&ei=u2_ATIPNE4Wcl

gff4Y2QCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAg#v=on

epage&q&f=false

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