A new kind of tutoring aims to make students smarter

Dan Hurley:

IN the back room of a suburban storefront previously occupied by a yoga studio, Nick Vecchiarello, a 16-year-old from Glen Ridge, N.J., sits at a desk across from Kathryn Duch, a recent college graduate who wears a black shirt emblazoned with the words "Brain Trainer." Spread out on the desk are a dozen playing cards showing symbols of varying colors, shapes and sizes. Nick stares down, searching for three cards whose symbols match.

"Do you see it?" Ms. Duch asks encouragingly.

"Oh, man," mutters Nick, his eyes shifting among the cards, looking for patterns.

Across the room, Nathan Veloric, 23, studies a list of numbers, looking for any two in a row that add up to nine. With tight-lipped determination, he scrawls a circle around one pair as his trainer holds a stopwatch to time him. Halfway through the 50 seconds allotted to complete the exercise, a ruckus comes from the center of the room.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at November 2, 2012 3:31 AM
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