There is a vast literature on "executive functioning," or the control of one's thoughts and actions in pursuit of a goal. This broad construct is conceptualized as comprising multiple executive functions (EFs) that support academic achievement and other important life outcomes. However, there is a lack of consensus regarding what,…

Second-language (L2) knowledge of English is an essential communication tool in the contemporary era of globalization in many research and business fields. Among the important tasks in English education is the measurement of student proficiency. While various tests purport to measure proficiency in learning English, repeated preparation and…

Recent research about the learning of science has suggested that misconceptions are not replaced by scientific conceptions and extinguished once conceptual change has occurred. Rather, misconceptions still exist alongside the acquired scientific conceptions and must be suppressed in order to use scientific conceptions. Our goal in this review is…

Although the field of educational neuroscience has grown in recent years, little research has been conducted on conceptual change and science learning through an educational neuroscience framework. Educational neuroscience is frequently used to study processes of language and mathematics cognition, but is not extensively applied to conceptual…

The development of the ability to anticipate--as manifested by preparatory actions and neural activation related to the expectation of an upcoming stimulus--may play a key role in the ontogeny of cognitive skills more broadly. This preregistered study examined anticipatory brain potentials and behavioral responses (reaction time; RT) to…

Thanks to unprecedented advances in brain science, we know more about the brain today than ever before. But what does that science tell us about how we learn? How can we capture the power of neuroscience research so that it benefits our students? Judy Willis and Malana Willis answer these questions with clarity and insight, translating recent…

Children with ADHD are often described as experiencing deficits in executive function. Two key areas of concern are inhibition, the ability to refrain from a dominant response when needed, and updating, the ability to revise or update incoming information. The purpose of this manuscript is to combine disparate lines of research to help establish a…

Dyslexia, or reading difficulty (RD), is characterized by slow, inaccurate reading and accompanied by deficit in executive functions (EF) and altered functional connectivity (FC) in the related networks (i.e., cingulo-opercular). Individuals with RD also present with altered oculomotor gaze patterns that include longer fixation times. The…

Since the turn of the millennium, there has been a surge of interest in diverse forms of spontaneous thinking, such as mind-wandering, and their associated brain networks. Studies demonstrate the pervasiveness of these phenomena as well as their effects on education-relevant domains such as academic skills, well-being, creativity, executive…

The present study presents the first attempt at investigating long-term mindfulness training in pre-adolescence, adopting an integrative neurodevelopmental approach. Pupils with an established mindfulness practice (n=33) were compared with mindfulness-inexperienced pupils (n=20) on dispositional mindfulness, executive functioning (EF), emotion…

The amount of intentional, instructional, purposeful play has decreased in primary grades, and didactic, test-driven instruction has increased. Emerging neuroscientific evidence is beginning to highlight the significant effects the toxic stress from poverty has on developing brains. Almost half of American children can be considered to come from…

Recent studies have proposed developments to the Simple View of Reading to reflect reading development across age groups and differences among learner profiles and account for additional factors that explain reading comprehension performance beyond word recognition and language comprehension. One of these proposals is the inclusion of cognitive…

Many social systems, especially education, have an opportunity to significantly improve individual performance and well-being outcomes by attending to and including brain fitness as part of their approach. Brain fitness, like physical fitness, requires exercise. Brain-based "workout" activities improve cognitive development, and their…

New advances in neurobiology are revealing that brain development and the learning it enables are directly dependent on social-emotional experience. Growing bodies of research reveal the importance of socially triggered epigenetic contributions to brain development and brain network configuration, with implications for social-emotional…

The synergistic potential of cognitive neuroscience and education for efficient learning has attracted considerable interest from the general public, teachers, parents, academics and policymakers alike. This review is aimed at providing 1) an accessible and general overview of the research progress made in cognitive neuroscience research in…