What we’ve learned about children’s growing minds
10 of our favourite pieces from BOLD’s first decade
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Happy 10th birthday to BOLD! Join us in celebrating 10 of our favourite pieces from over 1,000 that we’ve published since our launch in July 2016. Here are some big questions with insights from a hand-picked selection of the most popular and fascinating articles, interviews, podcasts, and videos on the science of children’s learning and development. Plus, read on for updates from contributors as they reflect on the science in the years after publication.
1. Why do teenagers make risky decisions?
Adolescents take more risks than adults, Laurence Steinberg explains in our first-ever article on BOLD. Yet adolescents are “surprisingly perceptive, informed, and rational” when thinking about risk. “The adolescent brain’s reward center is exquisitely sensitive to opportunities for pleasure”, he says. “The combination of an easily activated reward center and a still maturing capacity for self-control makes it hard to resist the pull of potentially pleasurable experiences.” Hear more in our podcast episode with Laurence.
For our most up-to-date insights into adolescence, read Meeri Kim on changing the narrative around adolescence to recognise that it can be a time of promise and possibility.
2. What helps young people thrive in a challenging world?
Hearing about climate change, biodiversity loss, habitat destruction, and the impacts of these on the future can leave young people feeling anxious and uncertain. We created our animation Learning to thrive to support conversations between adults and young people in this challenging world. The learning and support materials that sit alongside the video are full of practical activities so caregivers and educators can explore connections to the natural world with young people.
Our free five-part newsletter course brings you science and activities around talking, noticing nature, connecting with people and places, playing, and wellbeing. These activities and conversations are designed to help young people feel less anxious and more active in their communities.
“Hearing about climate change, biodiversity loss, habitat destruction, and the impacts of these on the future can leave young people feeling anxious and uncertain.”
3. How important is the family for children’s education?
Caregivers impact children’s feelings and attitudes about school. In an episode of our podcast Teachers’ Voices, host Nina Alonso explores how adults at home shape children’s school lives, including their academic outcomes.
Reflecting on the episode five years later, Nina says: “I see again and again that children’s home realities are often much more complex than school systems seem to assume. Both in field work and in conversations with teachers, I have noticed that in vulnerable contexts where learning outcomes are low, fathers are often absent, parents need to leave home for work, and grandparents or older siblings become the people most involved in children’s daily care and learning.”
Nina hopes there will be more work to understand the often invisible caregiving realities that shape children’s learning.
4. How can adults raise children’s self-esteem?
Eddie Brummelman tells me: “Most of us try to raise children’s self-esteem by lavishing them with praise. If we tell children over and over again how incredible they are, won’t they eventually believe us and develop high self-esteem? In some cases, the opposite is true.”
In Eddie’s article, he gives science-based ways to raise children’s self-esteem: “helping children reflect on how they have improved over time, offering them constructive criticism, and accepting and valuing them for who they are, unconditionally.” He tells me that since the article, new research has strengthened these conclusions. When parents accept and value children conditionally, by saying “I love you if…”, for example, children feel that they are worthy only if they live up to external standards.
“I hope that science can continue to help us raise a happier, more confident, and more generous generation”, he says.
5. What motivates children to persist through challenges?
Children learn how hard to try from the adults around them. Julia Leonard explains in her interview that we can help young children try harder by praising their effort, sharing when our struggles lead to success, and letting them try to solve problems on their own. Julia’s own motivation differed from her sister’s, which led her to ask some fundamental questions about how predispositions and experiences shape interests, skills, and beliefs.
“I loved the opportunity to share my science in a more personal way, weaving in the story of coming to appreciate my sister’s singular passion for theatre”, Julia says. “I also hope readers connected personally with these universal questions: How do we figure out what is worth our effort in this world? And how can we help children push through difficulties to reach their goals?”
6. Does social media impact teen mental health?
In our guest podcast EdTechnical, hosts Libby Hills and Owen Henkel speak to experts about AI in education and broader themes around technology and young people. Looking back on their episode with psychologist and researcher Candice Odgers, Owen tells me, “the headline from Candice is that data linking social media to youth mental health is much messier than the public conversation suggests.”
He says there is an opportunity cost in focusing on social media. “Even granting some harm from social media, fixating on it as the driver of poorer mental health risks crowding out attention to factors with much stronger evidence: the parental mental health crisis, and the unequal scaffolding kids get at home and school.”
7. What strengths might children gain through adversity?
Children living in adverse conditions like poverty are more likely to struggle in school. But what if some of these children have abilities that are enhanced through adversity, ‘hidden talents’ that educators can harness to promote their learning? In an animated video, see how learning environments could be designed to enable children to make the best use of their hidden talents.
In a recent follow-up piece, Willem Frankenhuis says: “Every effort should be made to reduce the adversities children face. However, uncovering more about the skills and strategies they develop in response to adversity will give them the best possible opportunities to thrive.” Willem believes in communicating thoughtfully about the science of both vulnerabilities and strengths.
8. How should children learn the times table?
Memorizing the times table is one of the biggest rote learning challenges for children, says Dror Dotan. Proficiency in arithmetic and algebra requires children to recall the multiplication table up to 10 x 10, without relying on time-consuming strategies.
“One thing that makes it hard to memorize the multiplication table is similarity between facts – as in the case of 8 x 8 = 64 and 8 x 6 = 48. Unfortunately, many memory tasks become harder if the items to be remembered are similar.” In his article, Dror shows that children find it easier to learn if a given lesson focuses only on dissimilar facts, such as 6 x 4 = 24 and 9 x 9 = 81.
Does that mean children should stop learning the multiplication table in order? Not necessarily. Dror suggests that learning the products of 2, then 3, and so on could be useful at the initial stages of learning, and then learning dissimilar facts could come later when children understand multiplication conceptually.
9. What’s school like for bilinguals?
An estimated four in ten students are taught in languages they are not adequately familiar with. “Children who struggle at school because they do not understand the language they are taught in are likely to feel frustrated and drop out”, Ivy Nkrumah says in her interview. Ivy followed up with us recently, two years after that interview. She sees a tension between what supports learning and what learners and parents in Ghana want.
“When local languages were used for instruction, particularly in rural communities, I saw that learners participated more actively, asked more questions, and demonstrated stronger understanding”, Ivy says in her follow-up article. But many of these learners wanted to learn in English because they associate English with employment, travel, and future success. Ivy is now investigating how to implement a blended approach so that children can learn through familiar languages while developing proficiency in English.
“An estimated four in ten students are taught in languages they are not adequately familiar with.”
10. What helps highly sensitive children?
Some children are more sensitive than others. “Heightened sensory sensitivity can manifest itself as sensitivity towards sound, light or smell, as well as enhanced attention to details, high empathy and emotional awareness”, Melissa Hogenboom explains in her article. “Highly sensitive people process more information and detail about the world than those who are not highly sensitive.”
Melissa likens highly sensitive children to orchids: “They are more vulnerable and need just the right amount of light, temperature and warmth to flourish. In the right environment, orchids will do exceptionally well.” Melissa says in her more recent article that adults can help children who have this trait by providing a warm and structured environment at home, plus extra understanding and compassion in response to outbursts.
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