EHE News
Using biology to help children struggling with math, reading
Sara Hart
Steve Petrill
When you go to the doctor, you expect to discuss your family's disease history. This information gives your doctor insights into your needs for maintaining health.
Two EHE researchers, PhD candidate Sara Hart and Professor Steve Petrill, Human Development and Family Science, advocate using this approach in the educational setting as well.
"Let's take a family history of math and reading difficulties as soon as a child enters the classroom," says Hart, whose dissertation research is supported this year by the Lucile and Roland Kennedy Scholarship Fund. "If a child's family has a history of reading or math disability, he or she may have different intervention needs compared to a child who simply hasn't had enough exposure to books or numbers.
"By taking biology into account, we have a more holistic approach to teaching. Intervention can start at once, instead of waiting for problems to emerge."
Lucile Kennedy ('21 BS, Home Economics) would be pleased her endowed fund, created after her death in 1988, supports Hart and other exceptional students. Thanks in part to EHE scholarships and fellowships,* Hart has co-authored 13 peer reviewed journal articles and a peer reviewed chapter, a remarkable record for a doctoral student.
Hart, who is from Toronto, Canada, says the funding leverages Petrill's grant dollars by paying for things the grants cannot: her fees, books, some conference travel and her dissertation writing time. That funded writing time is one reason why she is so prolific. The other reason is Petrill's mentorship.
"Dr. Petrill leads one of the most prominent twin projects in the world," she says. "I'm fortunate to work with him because he and his research team are the first to use a genetic framework to study in depth the development of reading, math and language performance and how reading, math and language disability intersect."
Math anxiety: Twin studies tell how much is nature, how much is nurture
One of Hart's particular interests is the effect of math anxiety on student performance. She explains how studying twins sorts out genetic from environmental effects.
"Identical twins share 100 percent of their genes; nonidentical twins share only 50 percent on average. We measure each member of the twin pairs. If, on a measure, the two identical twins correlate with each other to a greater extent than the nonidentical twins with each other, there are genetic influences."
Based on preliminary data, Hart is seeing large gender differences, with girls experiencing more math anxiety. By the end of the study, she will be able to tell what is different genetically and environmentally about math anxiety compared to math performance and ability. Although gender differences have been measured since this phenomenon was identified, Hart's study will be the first to explore the genetic effects on math anxiety and how these relate to math performance.
"Math anxiety has extra influence on classroom performance despite all the ability in the world to do math," she says. "Knowing that, educators can create effective classroom and intervention strategies."
"However, if something is genetic, that doesn't mean we can't change it," she elaborates. "As with environmental effects, it gives you more information to properly educate and, if needed, intervene with a child."
How you can help
Endowed scholarships and fellowships help the college recruit top students and to assist students in this time of economic recession. Lucile Kennedy's gift allows us to support distinguished scholar Sara Hart, who will graduate in spring 2010 and take her place in academia, applying her learning beyond our campus gates.
To discuss how to endow a fellowship or scholarship in the program area of your choice, contact Tracy Kirby, senior director of development, College of Education and Human Ecology, trkirby@ehe.osu.edu or (614) 292-5538.
*During her three years at EHE, Sara Hart also received the college's Florence L. and I. George Miller Memorial Scholarship and the Myrtle Wolcott Cram Scholarship.
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