Action-Focused Language in the Classroom
We ran a field study involving 45 prekindergarten schools, 130 teachers, and over 1100 children to test if targeting subtle properties of language could increase science engagement in children’s daily lives. We found that:
Children who heard more identity-focused language (e.g., “Let’s be scientists”; “This famous scientist made a discovery”) reported less interest in science.
Children who heard more action-focused language (e.g., “Let’s do science”; “Doing science means discovering new things”) showed more science persistence.
It is our goal to increase the amount of action-focused language kids hear about science both at home and in school. We know how hard teachers work, so we want to ensure that implementing action-focused language in the classroom is as easy as possible. Here is an example science lesson that uses action-focused language. This lesson is about friction, but you can implement action-focused language into any lesson.
Additional Resources:
Download our Activity Guides. These guides contain simple science experiments presented using action-focused language.
Play our Online Science Games. These games teach the concepts of friction, buoyancy, gravity, and transparency using acton-focused language.
Have any questions, comments, or ideas? Use this form to contact us!