Introduction

Basic academic skills represented in reading, writing, and mathematics have awakened particular interest in various disciplines due to their universal nature and their importance in formal educational processes, in which they are generally part of the required learning, their inclusion in school curricula. For many children, achieving this basic learning becomes a complex task that affects their initial educational performance and even their performance in later years. Thus, the first grades of primary school become a fundamental stage of school life and lay the foundations for the formal process of these initial academic competencies (^{Bravo, 2003}, ²⁰¹⁴). Therefore, one of the concerns of the education sector is to guarantee quality education for the optimal performance of this learning because they become the necessary support to assume the challenges of all the levels that make up the educational process, from preschool to tertiary education, not to mention the savings in educational costs due to grade repetition, among other problems (^{Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], 2016}; ^{Ministry of National Education [MEN], 2016}).

From a recent school dropout study conducted by the Ministry of National Education in Colombia, the intra-annual figure in students of public schools in the country during the last years had its highest peak in 2010 with 4.8%, showing decreasing and increasing fluctuations in the following years, a significant decrease of 2.37% in 2020, and a subsequent increase of 3.58% in 2021. As for the latter year, students who did not enroll in school were mostly those who had dropped out school (49.3%), those who had failed the school year (17.1%), and those who had passed the school year (5.4%). Among the causes identified, several factors were revealed, among which are those of an individual nature, such as school repetition, overage for grade, and late start of primary school (^{MEN, 2022}).

The results of international and national measurements of specific competencies show the educational panorama from the quality perspective, for which there is participation in the PISA tests (Program for International Student Assessment) in reading and mathematics, and the Pruebas Saber (Saber Tests) in grades 3, 5, 9 and 11. For the PISA tests presented in 2018, Colombia obtained average scores of 404 in mathematics and 413 in reading that were lower than those of the member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), with 489 in mathematics and 487 in reading. Similarly, the results compared to those obtained by some Latin American member countries showed reading scores lower than those of Chile, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Brazil and higher than those of Argentina, Peru, and the Dominican Republic. The performance in mathematics was lower than those of Uruguay, Chile, Mexico, Costa Rica, and Peru and higher than those of Brazil, Argentina, and the Dominican Republic. Specifically, these data also showed higher percentages of low performance in reading and mathematics, with 43% and 66%, respectively, compared to high performance, with only 1% and 0.3% (^{OECD, 2019}), for Colombian students.

The national standardized tests in Colombia, called Pruebas Saber, seek to measure knowledge level and skills of grade 3, 5, 9, and 11 students to measure competencies in areas such as Mathematics, Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Language, and Reading Comprehension. As for Mathematics and Language, the test results for grades 3, 5, and 9 show a significant percentage for insufficient level from 2012 to 2017. During these years, grade 3 mathematics scores fluctuated between 18% and 20% for insufficient level, compared to 23% to 30% for advanced level, a situation that worsens in grade 5 with 38% to 43% for insufficient level, compared to 11% to 14% for advanced level. For its part, grade 9 performance showed 20% to 25% for unsatisfactory level and between 4% and 6% for advanced level. For Language, the picture was not different because grade 3 showed between 18% and 23% for unsatisfactory level and between 18% and 22% for advanced level. Grade 5 had a greater gap for unsatisfactory level with 13% to 21%, compared to 12% to 16% for advanced level, and grade 9 showed a lower population for advanced level with 5% to 7%, compared to 11% to 18% for insufficient level (^{Instituto Colombiano para la Evaluación de la Calidad de la Educación [ICFES], 2018}).

As for the Saber 11 Tests, the results showed that from 2017 to 2021, the average overall score has been decreasing. Considering that the highest overall score is 500 points and the maximum specific score is 100 points, the average score was 262 in 2017, 253 in 2019, and 250 in 2021. Similarly, the specific score in reading and review remained at 54 points between 2017 and 2018, decreasing to 53 points in 2021. The mathematics scores remained at 52 points between 2017 and 2027 and decreased to 51 points in 2021. From the interpretation of the performance ranging from 1 to 4, the latter being the highest performance, the trend in both types of knowledge has been that level 3 has the largest proportion, followed by level 2 (^{ICFES, 2021}).

According to the above, we have found important variables, such as socioeconomic status, type of educational establishment and living area, urban or rural, which are related to academic performance measured both nationally and internationally, an example of which is the Saber 3, 5 and 9 tests that reflected significant differences in the results according to socioeconomic status, whereby the higher the socioeconomic status, the better the performance. Likewise, the Saber 11 tests evidenced that, in addition to the differences by socioeconomic level, there are also those related to the type of school, whether public or private, urban or rural, and the parents' level of education. The PISA test results showed that private school students in Colombia perform better than public school students (^{OECD, 2016}; ^{ICFES, 2018}, ²⁰²¹).

In general terms, the figures show that, both nationally and internationally, Colombia is below expectations in terms of performance in subjects associated with reading, writing, and mathematics skills, which may reflect weaknesses in the teaching and learning process. This scenario has led the Ministry of National Education to establish plans, programs, and projects to improve student core competencies from educational establishments to promote educational quality improvement (^{MEN, 2016}).

Regarding the socioeconomic factor, children in vulnerable situations are surrounded by adverse economic, nutritional, and cultural conditions that affect cognitive and academic development given that according to some studies, poverty has an impact at the brain level from the structural and the functional and implies low performance of skills such as memory, language, socioemotional processing, cognitive control, and self-regulation (^{Ghiglione et al., 2011}; ^{Lipina & Segretin, 2015}). Likewise, from the family environment, it was found that inadequate or insufficient stimulation received by the child and parents’ low level of education are elements that associate with low cognitive performance (^{Mazzoni et al., 2014}).

Considering the above, children from lower socioeconomic levels who begin schooling would be at a disadvantage in the basic neuropsychological repertoires necessary for the acquisition of basic learning; an example of this is the scientific evidence that states that the performance of tasks that require cognitive control, working memory, long-term memory, and phonological language are compromised, as well as comprehension language, vocabulary level, attentional skills, and executive functions, causing students to fall behind in the educational process due to grade repetition, lack of motivation, overage involvement, or school dropout, thus perpetuating in the medium and long term the family poverty line and therefore higher economic costs to the State and a decrease in the country's economic growth (^{Arán-Filippetti, 2012}; ^{Hermida et al., 2010}; ^{OECD, 2016}). An example of the above is supported by research that showed that socio-environmental conditions may even moderate the impact of the application of cognitive programs in low-income children, whereby situations such as housing characteristics, social resources, parental occupation, and family composition are considered predictors of cognitive performance (^{Segretín et al., 2014}).

Given the importance of its object of study, neuroscience has been related to different disciplines that respond to the needs of the individual and the community, so disciplines such as education are not outside this binomial (^{Pérez-Puelles, 2021}). According to ^{Zadina (2015}), in the nineties, there was talk of brain-based learning as a movement that sought to unite neuroscience and education, which for many at the time was implausible, while for others, it became not only a possibility but a felt need that would contribute to the construction of the educational curriculum, teacher training, and participation in educational reforms. Now, it is clear that neuroscience and education have two different languages and objectives; however, the benefits of this relationship are significant for education, which have been reflected in the contributions of various authors (^{Lipina et al., 2010}; ^{Vargas, 2018}).

^{Fuentes and Collado (2019}) highlighted that neurosciences enabled the emergence of the neuroeducation line, which arose in the twentieth century with the contributions of Odell in 1981 as a need to develop educational strategies from the brain base, so it was defined as the use of scientific research for the strengthening of better educational practices aimed to promote the integration between educational sciences and neurocognitive sciences, to contribute to the development of cognitive abilities in the areas in line with the school curriculum, to serve as scientific support in the teaching process and to contribute to the challenges of the new educational policies, emphasizing the need not only to create new educational methods but also to understand them. Other authors have defined it as the discipline that studies teaching and learning processes from the basis of brain functioning and the neurobiological supports that sustain it, aiming to strengthen the educational process from the understanding of how the brain changes and adapts in learning contexts (^{Mora, 2017}; ^{Valerio et al., 2016}).

^{Portellano (2016}) placed school neuropsychology in the wide range of neurosciences, defining it as that area of knowledge that seeks to develop strategies that contribute to school learning. Other authors, such as ^{Zadina (2015}), considered that educational neuroscience should be oriented to the transforming function of the school curriculum and the development of neuroscience-based pedagogical strategies. Thus, knowledge in both disciplines on the part of professionals should be an indispensable requirement.

^{Roselli and Ardila (2016}) traced the history of school neuropsychology to the very emergence of child neuropsychology in the mid-twentieth century, which was born precisely from the contributions of neuropsychology and school psychology, motivated by the interest in understanding the biological basis of learning difficulties in reading, writing, and mathematics, subsequently leading to the definition of specific learning disabilities known as dyslexia, dysgraphia and developmental dyscalculia, topics of interest that led to conducting several research studies. Similarly, they refer to school neuropsychology as a field of action of child neuropsychology, which is responsible for learning about learning problems and intervention through psychoeducational techniques.

^{Martin-Lobo and Arantzazu (2015}) described some objectives of school neuropsychology, highlighting the prevention of academic difficulties by identifying risks and weak aspects of development, the potentiation of higher thought functions, and the addressing of student specific needs, guiding the correction of learning difficulties from the application of methodologies and programs. In this same line, ^{Rhenals-Ramos (2021}) highlighted the processing of cognitive functions and their adjustment to school activities as objective and a fundamental basis for learning performance, such as reading and writing.

In this scenario, the most important contributions of school neuropsychology have been the understanding of the brain in the learning process and its applicability in educational practices, the attention to students with developmental and learning problems from early diagnosis and teaching guidelines for different learning rates, and the prevention of school problems from the identification of biopsychosocial risk factors and intervention to them. Thus, currently, the participation of this discipline as a source of scientific knowledge, contribution to the work of educational psychology, and also as a specific field of action in the school setting is becoming more relevant (^{Araya-Pizarro & Espinoza, 2020}; ^{Martínez-Álvarez, 2019}; ^{Pherez et al., 2017}; ^{Pimentel & Córdova, 2019}).

Authors such as ^{Ashton (2015}) highlighted the importance of narrowing the gap between clinical neuropsychology and educational neuropsychology based on a better contextualization of student needs according to this context and teamwork with the educational psychologist. In the same line, ^{D'Amato (1990}) reaffirmed that the application of neuropsychological principles to education is important in the areas of assessment and differential diagnosis, which have been considered the traditional contributions, but much further in the assessment and intervention link based on brain functioning, to resort to the use of appropriate remediation programs.

^{Portellano (2016}) specifically referred to school neuropsychological stimulation, defined as a training program of higher mental functions aimed to improve student school performance by activating myelination, neurotransmission, and neurogenesis processes. From another perspective, reference is made to early neuropsychological care, defined as a set of actions that respond to the transitory or permanent needs of children with developmental difficulties or at risk of developing them, considering the period from 0 to 6 years old. Among the basic premises that should be taken into account for these programs are: a) the preventive nature with emphasis on risk factors; b) the globality that implies the intervention to the various contexts of the child; c) interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity through the knowledge of related disciplines (^{Arnedo et al., 2015}).

Neuropsychological stimulation programs are supported by the concept of brain plasticity or neuroplasticity, which is defined as the capacity or sufficiency of the brain to adapt structurally and functionally and adjust to the development of activities demanded by the context (^{Araya-Pizarro & Espinoza, 2020}; ^{Pimentel & Córdova, 2019}). From this perspective, changes in the nervous system can occur from continuous processes in the short, medium, and long term as a product of various types of interventions, among which are training, rehabilitation, pharmacotherapy, enriched environments, and learning, among others. This explains the relevance of the interaction between the biological and environmental factors at any stage of development, even more so in the early years, in which the brain is mainly flexible and modifiable, an example of which is that an environment with diverse stimuli generates greater neuronal arborization and connection (^{Roselli & Matute, 2011}). It is clear then that the brain responds to environmental stimuli, so an enriched environment in the main contexts in which the child develops is essential for neuropsychological development.

Developing and applying neuropsychological programs requires considering variables such as child cognitive development and its correspondence with brain maturation, brain plasticity, the development of functional systems, the axes of ontogenetic development, changes throughout the life cycle, and the progressive lateralization of brain functions (^{Cuervo and Avila, 2010}; ^{Roselli et al., 2010}). Based on the above, it is important to highlight the importance of identifying the child's cognitive profile from the neuropsychological assessment since, from these results, stimulation and early intervention programs can be suggested (^{Roselli et al., 2021}).

The use of neuropsychological programs in the school context should be supported by scientific knowledge, the understanding of cognitive processes, the relationship of cognitive development and brain maturation, motivation and learning of students, and can be directed to the development of attention, visual, tactile and sensory integration skills, language, memory, multiple intelligences, creativity, executive functions, language, learning difficulties, or to improve performance in cases of developmental disorders (^{Martin-Lobo and Arantzazu, 2015}). As for intervention programs in children aged 3 to 6, the results show that it favors learning processes, becoming a key strategy for prevention from the school context (^{Martin-Lobo, 2017}).

Regarding studies aimed at evaluating the impact of cognitive stimulation on academic skills, ^{Bernal-Ruiz et al. (2020}), through comparative research on the stimulation of executive functions on executive performance and academic performance in first-grade school children, found a relevant improvement in executive performance of the experimental group that received 12 weeks of training, contrary to the academic performance that was evaluated from grades in language and mathematics, for which no differences were found between the evaluated groups, which for the researchers, could be related to the time of application of the program or other factors that do not necessarily explain its effect.

Likewise, a group of researchers formed by ^{Fernández-Abella et al. (2019}) oriented their work to identify the effect of an intervention program to improve working memory and basic mathematical skills in school children aged between 5 and 6 by using the methodology of two experimental groups, one with intervention through a virtual program, and the second with intervention in pencil and paper format, in addition to a control group. All groups were administered the Corsi Test, which evaluates visuospatial memory, and the Test for the Diagnosis of Basic Mathematical Skills (TEDI-MATCH) before and after treatment of the two experimental groups. The results evidenced that regarding working memory, there were improvements in the performance of all groups, with a statistical value mostly significant in the experimental groups, which showed that the type of format used in the intervention did not generate differences, and in the case of the control group, there was a slight improvement that was attributed to the process of cognitive development itself. As for basic mathematical skills, the experimental groups had the highest performance, which reinforced the theoretical hypothesis of association between working memory and mathematical skills.

We should add a study on a program to stimulate pre-reading skills in preschool children carried out by ^{Velarde et al. (2012}) in Peru, which applied a cognitive and psycholinguistic program called "Leíto. Preparémonos para la Lectura” (Leito. Let's Get Ready for Reading) during 60 sessions, with a frequency of four times per week and a duration of four months. They applied in this study a test of pre-reading skills before and after the intervention to the experimental group, in which they found that in the initial measurement, both the experimental group and the control group did not have significant differences in these skills. However, after the intervention, they found that the experimental group perform better in verbal memory from sentence repetition, in oral language from the semantic component, phonological awareness in rhyme recognition, and phonemic awareness in recognition of the initial, middle, and final phonemes.

As a way to intervene in the situation described above, neuropsychology as a scientific discipline has been interested in the promotion of psychoeducational activities and support activities for learning disabilities, especially when countries like Colombia and specifically regions like Urabá, where this research was conducted, have been hit by socioeconomic inequality, violence, and lack of favorable conditions for children to achieve adequate development. Then, it is urgent to bet on cognitive training programs that respond positively to the academic development of children in the early years to significantly increase not only cognitive skills but the impact that this improvement would have on academic skills.

To this extent, this work is relevant as it will allow us to identify whether the application of a neuropsychological program to socially vulnerable children during the first school year leads to better performance in reading, writing, and mathematics development. This proposal will help recognize the influence of early neuropsychological intervention in healthy children in the school context and its contribution to the optimization of learning processes, taking into account that most of the cognitive training works have been directed to the population with neurodevelopmental alterations. Likewise, works like this one can bring the gap between education and neurosciences closer by using the findings obtained in the practical field and integrating scientific knowledge to the generation of relevant intervention strategies for the educational population according to neurocognitive profiles (^{Vargas, 2018}).

This research is therefore aimed at first-grade children of a public school in the municipality of Apartadó, Antioquia, Colombia, of low socioeconomic level (1 and 2), directly benefiting the intervened students, participating parents, assigned teachers, and the school in general. The results of this proposal could respond to the cognitive needs of the population of low socioeconomic level, approached from the school environment, which is the closest space, of greater access and permanence for this population at an early age, achieving, in turn, the intervention of the family as co-responsible for the educational process. It is important to emphasize that it is a neuropsychological intervention program linked to the school curriculum, where teachers, directors, and the counseling department intervene.

Therefore, we seek to answer the following question: What is the effect of a neuropsychological intervention program applied to a group of first-grade primary school students on their subsequent performance in the academic skills of reading, writing, and mathematics.

Method

Results

As for academic skills, no statistically significant differences were found between the two groups evaluated at the pre-treatment level (p>0.05) in the reading and mathematics components, suggesting homogeneous performance in both groups in this first assessment. As for writing, significant differences (p>001) were found in the word and non-word subtests, with an effect size greater than 0.8, placing it in the large range (See Table 2).

As for academic skills, statistically significant differences were found in the reading component in the subtests of syllables, words, non-words, sentences, and words with errors in reading aloud a text, and reading speed. In the case of syllables and non-words, the effect size is large, while in the others, it is medium, and in words with errors in reading aloud a text, it is low. As for writing, significant differences were found in syllable writing, with a medium effect size; as for the mathematics component, no significant differences were found between the two groups (see Table 3).

The results of academic skills show that in all reading components, students perform better from one measurement to another, as well as in the writing components, except for name writing, and in mathematics, in arithmetic and mental and written calculation. The effect size is large in all subtests that showed a significant level, except for reading numbers, number dictation, and mental calculation, which obtained a medium effect size (See Table 4).

After measuring the academic skills before and after the neuropsychological stimulation program, the experimental group showed significant changes in all components of reading and writing with a large effect level; as for the mathematics components, changes were observed in counting, number dictation, number comparison, number ordering, and mental calculation. No significant changes were observed in number reading and written calculation (see Table 5).

Discussion

Several studies have analyzed the effect of cognitive stimulation programs on the development of cognitive and/or academic skills; however, most of these studies have been conducted from the clinical approach of neuropsychology, away from the educational scenario, specifically in classroom practice and their potential impact on academic development.

Therefore, the general objective of this research was to analyze the effect of a neuropsychological intervention program on the performance of academic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics in a group of first-grade primary school children of a public school. An attempt was made to test the effectiveness of the neuropsychological stimulation program in a sample of 38 children, 19 in the experimental group and 19 in the control group, who were enrolled in the first grade of primary school, aged 5 to 6.

For this purpose, the results of the initial assessment, pre-test evaluation, was first analyzed, showing homogeneity characteristics in the reading, writing, and mathematics components, with some differences in two of the writing subtests such as word writing and non-word writing, which showed better performance in the experimental group; the other subtests of this domain did not show significant differences.

After applying the neuropsychological stimulation program, significant differences were identified between both groups in reading and writing, specifically in the syllable and non-word reading components, with a large effect size; words, sentences, and reading speed, with a medium effect size; and words with errors in reading aloud and reading speed, with a small effect size. As for writing, the difference was in syllable writing, with medium effect size. The above results confirm the hypothesis that the application of a neuropsychological intervention program in first and second graders improves the acquisition of basic academic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics in a group of children, taking into account that only in reading and in writing subtest, a significant post-training impact was obtained.

This finding is consistent with the results of other studies that point out the relevance of the neuropsychological functions in fundamental academic skills learning, particularly with reading in the reading accuracy and speed components. An example of this is the evidence that has shown that the skills to identify and discriminate words and recognize known words and less frequent words relate significantly with the performance of selective visual, sustained, and spatial attention (^{De Abreu et al., 2017}; ^{Ison & Korzeniowski, 2016}; ^{Roselli et al., 2006}; ^{Saj & Barisnikov, 2015}). From this point of view, attention plays an important role in the learning process, necessary to carry out sensory, cognitive, or motor activities, functioning as a filter responsible for selecting, prioritizing, processing, and monitoring information, discarding and inhibiting unwanted information (^{Portellano, 2005}; ^{Portellano & García, 2014}).

Phoneme identification, phoneme addition, word reading, non-word reading, syllable segmentation, rhyme detection, and word and non-word reading speed are related to oral language development and naming speed (^{Aguilar et al., 2010}; ^{Arango-Tobón et al., 2018}; ^{González et al., 2013}). Language has an important regulatory function in school learning because it enables how thought is expressed (^{Allignani et al., 2011}) since, in addition to this, children communicate information to others through language and regulates their life in general through the organization and expression of their emotions (^{Quintanar & Silovieva, 2002}).

The ability to discriminate and recognize signs such as figures, letters, words, and numbers is closely related to visual perceptual skills and visual memory (^{Pino & Bravo, 2005}). At early school ages between 6 to 8 years old, there is much greater engagement of these domains in word reading and reading comprehension activities (^{De la Calle, 2019}).

Other studies demonstrated the relationship of executive functions in reading comprehension, specifically those derived from working memory and verbal fluency, an aspect that was not found in this study (^{Arán-Filippetti & López, 2016}), which coincides with the study conducted by ^{Bernal-Ruiz et al. (2020}) who found no significant effects on academic skills, following a training program in executive functions for three months.

The above may indicate that early intervention in the above-mentioned neuropsychological functions becomes a support strategy for learning academic skills that should interact with other determinants mentioned in the scientific evidence, such as teaching methodologies and reading strategies (^{Bravo, 2000}, ²⁰¹⁸), so teacher participation and approach in each of them becomes a fundamental support (^{Pascual et al., 2018}).

The intra-group analysis showed that both groups significantly improved in academic skills between the first and second measurements. For its part, the control group showed no differences in name writing, and the experimental group show no differences in number reading and written calculation. The effect size was large in the majority of components in both the control and experimental groups, showing that factors such as the schooling process positively affect the development of basic academic skills in seven months, in which the children were able to acquire important learning according to the institutional curricular processes; likewise, in this case, the effect of the program contributed significantly to the performance of skills in reading accuracy, fewer reading errors and reading speed, and as for writing, in syllable writing.

The improvements in reading performance coincide with that proposed by ^{Ghiglione et al. (2011}), who, through a neuropsychological intervention program, sought to demonstrate that cognitive development can be favored in children at risk of poverty by adapting strategies to the school curriculum, concluding that after the intervention, children were able to access word reading. Additionally, other training demonstrated improvement in initial, middle, and final phoneme recognition (^{Velarde et al., 2012}) and even mathematical skills (^{Fernández-Abella et al., 2019}). This means that reading does not emerge suddenly in a process of cultural appropriation that occurs in the school environment, as described by ^{Bravo in 2003}, but is part of cognitive repertoires that support this learning.

The results of this study support the relevance that the development of neuropsychological intervention programs in the classroom context, thought from different objectives, would have, first, as an alternative to favor cognitive development at the beginning of the school process, taking into account the socioeconomic differences that generate disadvantages in children in situations of poverty, second, as a prevention program against possible risks of learning difficulties, which would reduce future corrective actions, and, third, as a strategy to enhance and optimize the cognitive resources necessary for the development of basic academic skills necessary for academic success (^{De Abreu et al., 2017}; ^{Ison & Korzeniowski, 2016}).

In addition to the above, these programs should become part of the school curriculum as a form of precursor to learning, which can be addressed in the teaching program of the early school years and led by teachers without requiring professionals in psychology or neuropsychology to that end (^{Aglio, 2016}).

As final considerations, it can be highlighted that a neuropsychological stimulation program applied to first-grade children has positive effects on both cognitive development and learning of basic skills, such as reading, an element that adds to the school, family, and social factors that children require to advance in their education process. Family participation in the knowledge of cognitive skills and its importance in academic development supports the awareness of these precursors in the home context.

This study has several limitations in its interpretation. The first limitation is that it was conducted with a group selected at convenience, of socioeconomic level 1 and 2, from a public school; therefore, the results are not generalizable. The number of participants was reduced in the course of the study due to student withdrawal from the school or continuous non-attendance, which is why we ended up with a sample of 38 children. The typical dynamics of schools, such as unschooling for administrative reasons or internal events, interrupted the intervention from one day to another, which was not foreseen in the program.