Assessing Impact of Active Learning on Student Outcomes: Texas Initiatives for Children's Activity and Nutrition (ICAN)

Background: Active learning is designed to pair physical activity with the teaching of academic content. This has been shown to be a successful strategy to increase physical activity and improve academic performance. The existing designs have confounded academic lessons with physical activity. As a result, it is impossible to determine if the subsequent improvement in academic performance is due to: (1) physical activity, (2) the academic content of the active learning, or (3) the combination of academic material taught through physical activity.

Methods / Design: The Texas I-CAN project is a 3-arm, cluster randomized control trial in which 28 elementary schools were assigned to either control, math intervention, or spelling intervention. As a result, each intervention condition serves as an unrelated content control for the other arm of the trial, allowing the impact of physical activity to be separated from the content. That is, schools that perform only active math lessons provide a content control for the spelling schools on spelling outcomes. This also calculated direct observations of attention and behavior control following periods of active learning.

Discussion: This design is unique in its ability to separate the impact of physical activity, in general, from the combination of physical activity and specific academic content. This, in combination with the ability to examine both proximal and distal outcomes along with measures of time on task will do much to guide the design of future, school-based interventions.

Completed

Looking for future studies?

Notify Me

Key information

Conditions

Physical Activity Behavior Motor Activity

Sex eligibility

All sexes

Study type

Interventional

Phase

Not applicable

Who can participate

Healthy volunteers accepted: Yes

Only the study team can determine whether someone qualifies for participation.

Inclusion criteria

students in 4th grade in a participating elementary school and their 4th grade teachers

Exclusion criteria

none

Treatment and study plan

Texas I-CAN!

Behavioral

physically active, academic lessons in the elementary school classroom

Primary outcomes

Physical activity level

Time frame: one school week

time in moderate to vigorous physical activity
Time on task

Time frame: change in time on task from baseline to 15 minutes post academic lesson

student attentional focus in the classroom 15 minutes prior to and 15 minutes post active lesson implemented in the classroom on one school day
Acute academic achievement

Time frame: change in math and language arts scores from Baseline to 2 weeks

acute academic scores on math and language arts test developed by fourth grade teacher
Long-term math achievement

Time frame: Change in math achievement scores from Baseline to 7 months

Academic scores on math sub tests (Calculation, Fluency) of the Woodcock Johnson III
Long-term language arts achievement

Time frame: Change in language arts achievement from Baseline to 7 months

Academic scores on spelling sub test of the Woodcock Johnson III and comprehension section of Gates MacGinitie test

Sponsors and collaborators

Lead sponsor

University of Texas at Austin

Other

Registry information

Official study title

A Cluster Randomized Control Trial to Assess the Impact of Active Learning on Child Activity, Attention Control, and Academic Outcomes: The Texas I-CAN Trial

Acronym: ICAN

Important dates

Study start: 2012
Primary completion: 2015
Study completion: 2015
First posted: Mar 22, 2017
Registry last updated: Jun 26, 2017

OpenTrials presents study information sourced from ClinicalTrials.gov. The official registry record should be consulted for the latest information.

View the official ClinicalTrials.gov record (opens in a new tab)

This listing is for discovery and informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, does not guarantee that a study is recruiting, and does not determine eligibility. Contact the study team and a qualified healthcare professional when considering participation.

Published trials that share one or more normalized conditions with this study.

Completed