How to Prep for Regents Exams
With Regents tests right around the corner, this is always a busy time of year for high school students. While we at Braintrust do not believe in “teaching to the test,” we also know there is tremendous value in preparing students for tests, especially when it comes to something as important as the Regents. Here […]
Managing Test Anxiety
We’ve all felt nervous before a test or big performance. Sometimes you feel butterflies in your stomach, sweaty palms, or a pounding heart. You might also experience a moment of total panic as the test is handed out. But for most of us, once the test begins, we are able to use that burst of […]
The Magic (and Dangers) of Spellcheck
These days, just about everyone relies on spellcheck. With the technology to have all of our errors fixed for us, we save so much time. We no longer have to worry about whether our spelling is correct, or whether we have commas in the right place. But just how reliable are spellcheck programs? The Benefits […]
The Connection Between Reading and Writing
For a long time, reading and writing were taught as two separate subjects. In some classrooms, they still are. And although they are generally considered different skill sets, one cannot exist without the other. After all, everything we read has an author, right? Research shows that when we teach reading and writing interdependently, students’ skills […]
The Link Between Social-Emotional Learning and Academics
Social-emotional skills directly relate to students’ academic motivation and success. When students feel confident in their strengths and ability to improve, they are more likely to take academic risks. When they are able to positively interact with peers and teachers, they get even more out of their learning through opportunities for collaboration. In order to […]
Strategies for Tackling Complex Text
Kids often have a hard time navigating the difficult texts they have to tackle in middle school and high school. Between complex ideas and challenging language, these readings can feel impenetrable. That’s why Braintrust CEO and Co-Founder, Mara Koffmann, was so excited to speak with Alexis Ulaj about strategies for supporting students through these types […]
Number Strings
When a child is struggling in math, many parents today prescribe them more practice. This is intuitive. After all, practice makes perfect. And that’s how most of us were taught when we were in school. Rote memorization drills and pages filled with practice problems comprised most of our mathematical instruction. In short, learning math was […]
Brainstorming for Writing
For some students, coming up with ideas for writing feels impossible. And it can be just as challenging to teach the process effectively. For students who don’t know how to read, there are explicit strategies that they can work on repeatedly. With practice, these strategies will help them build their decoding and comprehension skills. But […]
Real World Math
How many times have you heard the phrase “I’m never gonna use it in real life!” as you plead with your child to do their math homework? It’s one of the oldest excuses in the book. Students who don’t like math, or feel they aren’t good at it, often use this reasoning to justify their […]
Developing Math Fact Fluency
A student’s experience with math completely changes when they develop fact fluency. Knowing math facts (single-digit problems in all four operations) allows students to complete problems more quickly and more efficiently. It also allows students to work through math problems with more flexibility in how they view the numbers involved. This is typically when students […]
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