Faculty Directory

Elida Laski

Program Director, Applied Psychology and Human Development, B.A.

Associate Professor

Department

CDEP Counseling, Developmental & Educational Psychology

Profile

Laski’s work uncovers the cognitive processes underlying learning, producing insights that improve instructional materials. Her expertise includes early mathematical thinking and development and the application of cognitive science, experimental designs, and small-scale intervention studies to education.

Laski is the principal investigator for °¬¿ÉÖ±²¥ College’s Thinking and Learning Lab, which studies cognitive development with a primary focus on mathematical knowledge. The strategies emerging from its published research have earned attention from The Wall Street Journal, CBS, and the International Business Times.

Since 2009, she has taught in the Lynch School’s CDEP Department. Her students benefit from Laski’s immersion in the latest research: She’s on the editorial boards of the Journal of Montessori Research and Bordon: Revista de Pedagogia, and she reviews articles for 20 other national and international publications. Her dozens of talks and presentations testify to her deep commitment to sharing her knowledge.

In 2015, the American Psychological Association gave Laski its Outstanding Paper Award (Early Career, Division 7 – Developmental Psychology). She has earned awards for her mentoring as well as °¬¿ÉÖ±²¥ College’s Teaching with New Media Award.

Select Publications

  • Vasilyeva, M., Laski, E.V., Casey, B. M., Liu, L. , Wang, M. , Cho, H.  (2023). Spatial-numerical magnitude estimation mediates early sex differences in the use of advanced arithmetic strategies. Journal of Intelligence,11(5), 97. doi.org/10.3390/jintelligence11050097 
  • Liu, L. , Vasilyeva, M., Laski, E.V. (2023). Minor changes, big differences? Effects of manipulating materials on parental math talk. Developmental Psychology. doi.org/10.1037/dev0001550 
  • Laski, E.V. (2023). Bridging cognitive science and teaching practice: A proof of concept study of the Cognitive Instructional Technique (CIT) observation instrument. Journal of Educational and Psychological Research, 5(1), 588-594. 
  • Vasilyeva, M., Laski, E.V., Veraksa, A., & Bukhalenkova, D. (2022). What children’s number naming errors tell us about early understanding of multidigit numbers. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 224, 105510. 
  • Dearing, E., Casey, B., Davis-Kean, P.E., Eason, S., Gunderson, E., Levine, S.C., Laski, E.V., Libertus, M., Lu, L., Lombardi, C.M., Nelson, A. (2022). Socioeconomic variations in the frequency of parent number talk: A meta-analysis. Education Sciences, 12(5), 312. doi.org/10.3390/educsci12050312 
  • Laski, E.V., Ermakova, A. , Vasilyeva, M., & Halloran, K., (2021). Effects of Using One or More Manipulatives on Strategy Mastery and Generalization. Journal of Experimental Education, 91(2), 1-19. doi.org/10.1080/00220973.2021.1973358 
  • Vasilyeva, M., Laski, E.V., Veraksa, A., & Bukhalenkova, D. (2021). Leveraging measurement instruction to develop kindergartners’ numerical magnitude knowledge. Journal of Educational Psychology, 113(7), 1354-1369. doi.org/10.1037/edu0000653 
  • Schiffman, J. , & Laski, E.V (2018) Materials count: Linear-spatial materials improve young children’s addition strategies and accuracy, irregular arrays don’t. PlosONE, 13(12), e0208832. 
  • Vasilyeva, M., Laski, E.V., Veraksa, A., Weber, L. , & Bukhalenkova, D. (2018). Distinct pathways from parental beliefs and practices to children’s numeric skills. Journal of Cognition and Development, 19, 345-366. doi.org/10.1080/15248372.2018.1483371 
  • Collins, M.  & Laski, E.V. (2018). Digger deeper: Shared deep structures of early literacy and mathematics involve symbolic mapping and relational reasoning. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 46, 201-212. doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2018.02.008

Select Grants

  • National Science Foundation, NSF ECR-Core 24-26 PI: Bethany Rittle-Johnson at Vanderbilt University, Co-PI: Elida Laski Leveraging Numerical Patterns in a Modified Board Game to Improve Numeracy Knowledge in Primary School Students, $857°­Ìý
  • Caplan Education Foundation 24-26 PI: Elida Laski; Co-PI: Marina Vasilyeva Facilitating Parent Math Talk through Games, $58,924
  • Ignite, °¬¿ÉÖ±²¥ College Provost's Office 24-25 PI: Elida Laski; Co-PI: Marina Vasilyeva Home Math Environment: Perspectives and Practice of Economically Disadvantaged Families, $29,967
  • Lynch School of Education and Human Development, Collaborative Fellows Grant PI: Marina Vasilyeva; co-PI: Elida Laski Embedding Math Learning Opportunities in an After-School Program: A Collaboration between the African Community Education Center and °¬¿ÉÖ±²¥ College, $120,000.
  • Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences (IES) 2020-2025. Recruiting Spatial-Numerical Representation to Enhance the Use of Advanced Math Strategies in Low-Income Students, PI: Marina Vasilyeva; co-PI: Elida Laski, $1.4MÂ