TEACHING THE LANGUAGE OF EARTH SCIENCE IN THE DIGITAL AGE: BEST PRACTICES FOR THE K-12 CLASSROOM WITH A FOCUS ON ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS AND CONTENT ABSORPTION IN VIRTUAL CLASSROOMS

Earth science is a notoriously vocabulary rich, jargon heavy subject to teach. The educational landscape is changing, more so with the move to all-remote learning. Multiple studies sighted in my research state that science is a language in and of itself. The goal of this study is to determine the best practices, the best classroom methods to unlocking the language of science for students.

We must employ the dynamics of the language arts classroom to successfully teach earth science to those students who have been labeled “English Language Learners.” Firstly, we must show students how the core vocabulary of earth science is not so different from their own language. We must look at the structure of the language of science jargon and find ways to help students break down larger, complicated, words and concepts in order to better understand the processes they study. Secondly, we must use “culturally relevant” examples to give our students further references points from real life, with regards to the content of our lessons. Lastly, we must cultivate a love of earth science, or at the very least provide examples that spark interest in the subject matter our students are studying.

All of this becomes more difficult to accomplish in the digital classroom. There are no hands-on experiments. Digital classrooms make it impossible to keep an eye on the progress of your students, in real time. You can no longer casually look over a student’s shoulder and quietly correct them, showing them exactly what they did wrong in less than a moment. These small interactions become email exchanges that may take hours, due to many factors including access to a reliable internet source.

Ultimately, the purpose of this study is to produce better, more aware pedagogues. We all come into the classroom with different ideas about the language of earth science. You have chosen this field because you love earth science in some shape or form, but not every student, maybe not even every third student, you teach will feel as passionate about the subject as you do. It is our job as scientists and as educators to lower the frustration level of our students (some say this is the biggest deterrent to a love of science) in order to allow them access to the content. We owe it to our students, ourselves, and most importantly future generations to produce scientifically literate graduates.