**Project Summary**
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There has been much attention to how to enhance children's math learning via curricula implemented on the school front. Although this approach is critical, it does not address the fact that children spend a large proportion of their time outside of school, frequently with at least one of their parents. Thus, there should also be a focus on the home front to identify what can be done to support children in math. Indeed, there is much evidence that parents’ practices play a role in the development of children's math skills. Unfortunately, relatively little is known about how to optimize parents’ practices around math. Consequently, parents are an underutilized resource in the effort to improve children's achievement in math. This research addressed this issue by examining the efficacy of inducing parents to hold a growth mindset in which math ability is viewed as malleable. The central hypothesis is that a growth mindset about math ability leads to parenting practices that enhance children's math learning via a motivational orientation that sustains children in the face of challenge.
The research is the first to examine how cultivating growth mindsets in parents sets in motion socialization processes that lead to enduring benefits for children in math. In addition, parents’ practices around math have often been studied without consideration as to whether they facilitate children's motivation critical in their navigation of challenge. This is a sizeable lacuna given that the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (2000) and Common Core standards demand a conceptual understanding of math, which can be challenging for children. A major contribution of the research is that it identified how to promote parenting practices that boost children's motivation, which is of much significance given the contemporary math curricula. The research also systematically investigated the novel idea that scaffolding contexts can support parents in developing constructive practices that can be generalized to their everyday interactions with children.
**Participants**
The research included children in the first and second grades (6-10 years of age) and their parents who live in central Illinois.
**Procedure**
Data was collected through video recordings, achievement tests, questionnaires, and behavioral choices in the RPI's laboratory, private rooms or areas at schools. Teacher reports and school record data were also utilized. An experimental intervention was conducted where parents were exposed to either growth mindset information or no mindset information about math, and received either math scaffolding activities or general skills scaffolding activities. Families were then followed over two years. As three cohorts of families were included in the research, data collection lasted at five years from 2016 to 2021.
Families participated in four phases of data collection, beginning in the fall of the school year.
**Phase 1:** This phase consisted of five key components of data collection that took place in the fall and winter (i.e., September to March): (a) Parents completed a brief survey either over the internet (e.g., with Qualtrics), on the phone, or with a paper-and-pencil survey; the format depended on each parent’s preference. Parents provided information on their beliefs (e.g., mindsets about the malleability of ability and feelings of efficacy about helping children with schoolwork) and parenting practices (e.g., type of language about performance and type of assistance with homework) in the math arena in the survey. (b) Approximately one week later, parents took part in a one-hour session at our lab, or the school. During this session, parents received information that math ability can be developed (i.e., the mindset condition) or about the Common Core curriculum (i.e., the no-mindset condition) via a brochure; they completed a set of questions about the information to ensure they processed it fully. They then wrote a summary of the main points from the materials and how these points translated to daily life. (c) Parents’ beliefs were measured at the end of this visit just as in the initial survey; they also provided demographic information. (d) Children reported on their math beliefs and motivation at the visit. Their achievement was assessed with the math sub-scales of the Woodcock-Johnson Psycho-Education Battery-Revised. (e) Teachers completed a brief report on children's motivation.
**Phase 2:** Over this three-week phase, which took place immediately after Phase 1, parents engaged with their children in a series of scaffolding activities. The activities were given to parents to take home during the one-hour session at Phase 1. They also received small mementos to use with the activities that reiterated key points of the information they received in the first session of Phase 1. Parents were instructed to work with their children on each activity at least three times a week; each activity should have required no more than 10 minutes, but parents and children could spend longer if they liked. At the end of each week, brief fidelity assessments were made to ensure that parents were regularly engaging in the activities with their children; parents were asked to indicate on what days they engaged in the activities with their children and for how long. They were given a log to facilitate their reporting, which they could do over the Internet, on the phone, or with a paper-and-pencil survey, depending on their preference.
**Phase 3:** Three months after Phase 1, parents completed two sets of measures: (a) They completed daily reports of their parenting practices over two weeks. These were kept brief to maintain participation. (b) Upon completing the daily surveys at home, parents and children participated in a second in-person session in the lab or at school. Parents completed a survey assessment of parenting practices identical to that they completed in Phase 1. Several assessments of children were made: (a) Children's math motivation and achievement were assessed as in Phase 1. (b) Teachers reported on children's motivation as in Phase 1. (c) Children's grades for the year were obtained from schools.
**Phase 4:** Approximately 12 months after the initial lab visit in Phase 1, parents received a condition booster in the form of an informative brief video that reminded them about the information included in the brochures during Phase 1. Approximately 18 months after the initial lab visit in Phase 1, children's math motivation and achievement were assessed again as in Phase 1. For families that originally participated in the lab, this involved a third lab visit similar to the one in Phase 3. For families who originally participated in the schools, children were assessed at school as in Phase 3. Teachers again reported on children's motivation. Children's grades were also obtained.
**Measures**
This project has resulted in the production of several publications. The measures used in these studies have been made available in this project domain. These resources are intended for use in future research, facilitating further exploration and study in this field.