This intervention website is an integral part of the Learning Sciences and Brain Research project undertaken by the Center for Educational Research and Innovation of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Since 1999, this project has been working to determine what studies of brain imaging, genetics and development of human brain networks might be able to tell educators, parents and administrators about how to improve the educational experience. This website is the creation of the project’s networks on numeracy and literacy which have collected programs that have been shown in studies to be effective in modifying brain networks in ways that might be useful for future research and to make them available to the public in downloadable files free of charge for all interested users.

The goal of this website is to provide various communities interested in child development with the latest research based on examining changes in the brain based upon specific learning. We hope these programs can be used by parents, teachers, educational researchers, administrators, social policy developers and children to help determine and improve their effectiveness. We have started with critical skills of preschool and early schooling that involve paying attention, learning to read and to deal with number. We hope to expand the scope of our programs to include the necessary skills for developing expertise in science and mathematics. Our goal is to eventually have these programs in the major languages so that many users worldwide will be able to take advantage of them.

To use the current programs will require you to download them from our website into your computer. Specific instruction for doing so for is presented for each of the programs. When you use any of the program we ask you to fill out a brief form and to return it to us so that we will be aware of when and where they have been used and some of your reaction to them. The next phase of our project will make the programs interactive so you will not need to download them but can use them directly from the website. We hope this will make the programs easier to use and will also allow us to learn in more detail places where they need to be improved.

Each of the programs has been tested with children and results have shown improvement in skills. The programs that are thus far available are

Attention Training and Word Building. Two further programs for dyslexics and dyscalculics will be available soon.

A major part of our web based approach is to create an environment where researchers, teachers and children can work together to improve the use and effectiveness of our programs. Only children and parents can tell us if the programs can bring pleasure and improvement in their regard for educational experiences. Teachers can help us understand the need for better and more complete coverage. Brain researchers can improve our understanding of how underlying neural network change with experience. Together we can improve the programs and create better learning for children.