ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I examine the relations between children’s ability to understand others’ minds and their school achievement. I propose that theory of mind (ToM) is a cognitive tool that enables children to adjust better to school life and achieve higher academic results. To this end, I critically examine available research on the relation between ToM, reading comprehension, and mathematical skills. I propose the ‘ToM at school framework’, which states that the main processes through which ToM impacts children’s academic achievement are the following: Social relationships and competence, metacognition (i.e., sensitivity to criticism, metamemory, meta-reading, and beliefs about learning) and high-level language (i.e., mental state talk and metaphors). An important consequence of the ToM at school framework is that ToM improvement should increase children’s school performance, and this can be achieved through environmental factors (such as classroom composition and teacher’s teaching style) as well as explicit training (as demonstrated by previous studies).
