Khng, Kiat Hui

This paper provides an overview of key research conducted locally and internationally in the field of applied cognitive development, particularly working memory and executive functioning from early childhood to mid-adolescence. The focus is on understanding the reasons for low achievement in children, with a particular emphasis on the interaction of domain-specific knowledge, attentional, social-emotional, and motivational predictors of academic achievement. We also focus on research examining the efficacy of interventions to enhance cognitive, social-emotional, and academic skills. We highlight the directions in which we believe future work should proceed given current developments in the field, our own interests and core capacity, and the need to address important educational questions in Singapore. These include the need to develop more sensitive tests of specific cognitive abilities, continued efforts to develop interventions to support the development of both domain-general skills and domain-specific numeracy and mathematics skills, an understanding of individual differences in response to pedagogy and training, and the examination of social-emotional factors (e.g., anxiety) on cognition and learning. Continued collaborative efforts will allow us to address these questions with behavioural, physiological, and neurological data and will provide a deeper understanding of the child’s outcomes in response to the pedagogical environment.

The transition to formal learning in primary school is an important developmental milestone. In comparison to the more informal setting in preschool classrooms, the primary school classroom typically imposes considerably greater expectations for children to direct and sustain their attention toward academic work. Given that learning in school occurs through social interactions, children who are able to regulate their emotions and maintain positive relationships with peers and teachers also adapt better to the new environment. Collectively, the cognitive and socio-emotional competencies that facilitate children’s transition to formal schooling are known as school readiness skills. Many studies have shown that these skills, including early academic skills, self-regulation skills and social competencies predict later school success.

Across cultures and curricula, it is commonly observed that many beginning learners of formal algebra revert to familiar methods rooted in arithmetic reasoning to solve algebra problems. Though a prevalent cause for frustration in teachers trying to get students to practice and master letter-symbolic algebra, some have argued that such displays of “flexibility” in strategy choice should not be discouraged. Some even found children to be more successful in solving algebra problems when they use arithmetic methods (e.g., Nathan and Koedinger, 2000a). Are arithmetic methods more effective than algebraic methods in solving algebra word problems? Are students truly being “flexible” when they use arithmetic methods in situations calling for algebraic methods? Is it a case of flexibility or inflexibility when students persist in using arithmetic methods when they are no longer appropriate or effective? Are students’ strategy choices and their resulting success in solving algebra word problems contingent upon their cognitive capabilities and their understanding of algebra? We examined these questions by giving 157 Secondary 2 students a set of algebra word problems under specific instructions to use letter-symbolic algebra, as well as tests of their algebraic knowledge, intellectual ability, working memory, and inhibitory ability. Results revealed that(i) despite the specific instructions, a substantial number of students persisted in using arithmetic methods, suggesting a reluctance or inability to use letter-symbolic algebra; (ii)students were not more successful in solving algebra word problems when they used arithmetic methods; (iii) algebraic knowledge, intellectual ability, working memory, and inhibitory abilities contribute in both unique and overlapping ways to both strategy choice and success in solving algebra word problems.

Mindfulness and democratic attitudes in teachers seem to overlap in promoting teacher-student relationships and student learning in classrooms. To examine if there are positive associations between teachers' mindfulness and democratic attitudes, the current study examined relationships between dispositional mindfulness and teacher attitudes (democratic and autocratic) among 50 pre-service teachers in Singapore. Correlation analyses revealed a positive relationship between teachers ' democratic attitudes and their dispositional mindfulness and significant associations between specific components of mindfulness (Observing, Describing and Non-reactivity) and teachers' democratic and autocratic attitudes. A marginally significant difference was shown in democratic attitudes according to the experience of International Practicum (IP), where teachers with IP experience have lower democratic attitudes. This is contrary to what existing literature predicts. Overall , this study's findings can potentially provide directions for future programmes in Singapore to promote mindfulness and democratic attitudes in prospective teachers .

Test anxiety is a non-trivial issue in schools, especially in settings with high stakes examinations like Singapore. It is estimated that 10–40% of students, as young as age 7, suffer from test anxiety (von der Embse, Barterian, & Segool, 2013). Test anxiety can adversely impact psychological well-being and performance; schools are recognizing the need to equip students with skills to ameliorate the adverse effects of test anxiety. One technique that has been found to help children with test anxiety is deep breathing. In the PI’s previous ERFP study, it was found that teaching children to take deep breaths before a timed math test reduced their feelings of anxiety and enhanced their test performance (Khng, 2017). However, although it was hypothesized that deep breathing might enhance performance by increasing attentional focus, the authors found no significant effects of the deep breathing intervention on reducing behavioural measures of interference on a Flanker task (Eriksen & Eriksen, 1974), commonly used to index inhibitory control of attention to distractors.
Interventions, such as attention training, have at times been found to enhance brain functioning at the neurophysiological level without necessarily manifesting as improvements in direct behavioural performance. For instance, an attention training study with preschool children found EEG indicators of a more efficient executive attention network following training, despite the lack of significant behavioural effects during an attention task (Rueda, Checa, & Cómbita, 2012). Thus, the deep breathing intervention might have enhanced attentional focus at a neurofunctional level, at the level of brain functioning—even if no evidence was found at the behavioural level—and translate into better performance on the math test.
Electrophysiological and neuroimaging data are important sources of information for validating the efficacy/effects of interventions. Many interventions for children are carried out in the schools especially if they are educationally relevant. However, collecting data such as electroencephalography (EEG) from children during school-based tasks or interventions is difficult due to the costs and physical constraints of conventional equipment. High-resolution, medical/research-grade EEG systems tend to be very expensive, cumbersome and take a long time to set up, and can be uncomfortable for the child. This can deter children from participating in EEG studies, and limit the possibilities of collecting data for large-scale, school-based interventions. The recent development of low cost, lightweight, wireless, mobile EEG headsets that are quick and easy to set up and reasonably comfortable for children to wear, brings new possibilities to collect ecologically-valid EEG data in situ, during large-scale, school-based interventions.