A video featuring I-LABS research was part of The 2020 National Science Foundation STEM For All Video Showcase: Learning from Research and Practice. The showcase highlighted efforts to broaden participation and increase access to STEM learning. It brought together some of the most influential STEM researchers and practitioners in the world. From more than 170 videos, I-LABS’ entry was distinguished … Read More
Finding Math Activities
Children can learn important math concepts in everyday situations and through play. I-LABS Outreach develops materials to explain the science behind this process and to offer research-based activities. Click here to learn more about how play supports math learning. Click here to access the Instagram page and all the Finding Math activities.
Ashley Ruba Receives American Psychological Association 2021 Dissertation Award
I-LABS alum Ashley Ruba has received a 2021 Dissertation Award for Developmental Psychology from the American Psychological Association. This prestigious award recognizes individuals whose dissertations provide outstanding contributions to the field of developmental psychology. Congratulations Dr. Ruba! Read about the award here. Read more about Dr. Ruba here.
Communication Skills Predict Programming Aptitude
Modern programming languages have vocabulary and grammar, just like natural languages. This observation led I-LABS researcher Chantel Prat and her team to suspect that language skills might be a better predictor than math skills of the ability to learn programming. Her research showed that it was. These findings have profound implications for how programming languages are taught. The research was … Read More
Altruistic Food Sharing in Infants
Researchers at I-LABS published a study showing that infants act altruistically, sharing food with unfamiliar people. This is true even when infants are hungry. This behavior demonstrates that infants systematically override their biological drive in order to engage in prosocial, helpful behavior. I-LABS co-authors Barragan, Brooks, and Meltzoff published their work in Scientific Reports (part of the Nature publishing group). … Read More
Talking to Children About Race
I-LABS research scientist Allison Master spoke to the Sarasota Herald Tribune about why parents should overcome their discomfort and talk about race with children. Master offers concrete advice to help parents have healthy, engaged conversations. Read the article here.
Parent Coaching Advances Infant Language Development
Parentese is a style of speech that parents often use with their children. It has a slower tempo with higher pitch and exaggerated sounds, and it helps children learn language. Now I-LABS researchers Naja Ferjan Ramirez, Sarah Lytle, and Patricia K. Kuhl have shown that coaching parents in Parentese helps them use it more often. This leads to improved language … Read More
New Research on Second Language Acquisition
I-LABS has created an online program that trains teachers to help infants learn a second language. The new study demonstrates that the play-based program is effective in teaching young children from a wide variety of backgrounds. Because trainers learn the program online, the training is scalable and widely available. Naja Ferjan Ramírez, assistant professor of Linguistics and former I-LABS research … Read More
I-LABS Outreach Team Releases 4 New Modules
I-LABS Outreach has developed 4 new learning modules focused on early math acquisition. Module 20 – Early Numeracy Research tells us that early math skills are one of the best predictors of later success in school. Learn more here. Module 21 – Spatial Skills and Reasoning We use spatial thinking every day, and it is an essential part of school readiness. … Read More
Deaf Infants Have Accelerated Gaze Following
Researchers and colleagues at I‐LABS published the first study of gaze following with Deaf infants of Deaf parents. The results show that Deaf infants had enhanced gaze following in comparison to hearing infants of the same age and gender. This suggests that Deaf infants pay special attention to social-communicative cues of other people due in part to exposure to sign language. The … Read More