Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words

Overcoming the complex and technical language used in science is a major barrier to scientists being able to communicate their work with the general public. This can lead to misunderstanding and mistrust of science, with many negative consequences. Scientists are increasingly seeking to improve thei...

Descripción completa

Guardado en:

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal:	Justin A. Pruneski
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	American Society for Microbiology 2018
Materias:	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/84bb4f7fffc9497a8cbf85dd0ba1a1f9
Etiquetas:	Agregar Etiqueta Sin Etiquetas, Sea el primero en etiquetar este registro!

id	oai:doaj.org-article:84bb4f7fffc9497a8cbf85dd0ba1a1f9
record_format	dspace
spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:84bb4f7fffc9497a8cbf85dd0ba1a1f92021-11-15T15:04:53ZIntroducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words10.1128/jmbe.v19i1.14171935-78851935-7877https://doaj.org/article/84bb4f7fffc9497a8cbf85dd0ba1a1f92018-03-01T00:00:00Zhttps://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jmbe.v19i1.1417https://doaj.org/toc/1935-7877https://doaj.org/toc/1935-7885Overcoming the complex and technical language used in science is a major barrier to scientists being able to communicate their work with the general public. This can lead to misunderstanding and mistrust of science, with many negative consequences. Scientists are increasingly seeking to improve their ability to communicate their work effectively with a variety of audiences. As such, students should recognize the challenges and importance of communicating science with nonscientists. This short classroom activity takes advantage of a free, web-based tool, called Simple Writer (https://xkcd.com/simplewriter/), which facilitates the writing and revising of text using only the 1,000 most commonly used words in English. Students are asked to write a paragraph in response to a prompt and use the Simple Writer tool to convert it into a form using only the 1,000 most commonly used words, while still maintaining the same message. By experiencing the difficulty of converting a relatively simple paragraph to meet to this criteria, students gain an appreciation for the challenge of removing jargon from scientific and other technical writing. Beyond the initial activity, the Simple Writer platform can be used in various other ways to engage students in learning science and developing essential writing skills.Justin A. PruneskiAmerican Society for MicrobiologyarticleSpecial aspects of educationLC8-6691Biology (General)QH301-705.5ENJournal of Microbiology & Biology Education, Vol 19, Iss 1 (2018)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5
spellingShingle	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5 Justin A. Pruneski Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
description	Overcoming the complex and technical language used in science is a major barrier to scientists being able to communicate their work with the general public. This can lead to misunderstanding and mistrust of science, with many negative consequences. Scientists are increasingly seeking to improve their ability to communicate their work effectively with a variety of audiences. As such, students should recognize the challenges and importance of communicating science with nonscientists. This short classroom activity takes advantage of a free, web-based tool, called Simple Writer (https://xkcd.com/simplewriter/), which facilitates the writing and revising of text using only the 1,000 most commonly used words in English. Students are asked to write a paragraph in response to a prompt and use the Simple Writer tool to convert it into a form using only the 1,000 most commonly used words, while still maintaining the same message. By experiencing the difficulty of converting a relatively simple paragraph to meet to this criteria, students gain an appreciation for the challenge of removing jargon from scientific and other technical writing. Beyond the initial activity, the Simple Writer platform can be used in various other ways to engage students in learning science and developing essential writing skills.
format	article
author	Justin A. Pruneski
author_facet	Justin A. Pruneski
author_sort	Justin A. Pruneski
title	Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
title_short	Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
title_full	Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
title_fullStr	Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
title_full_unstemmed	Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words
title_sort	introducing students to the challenges of communicating science by using a tool that employs only the 1,000 most commonly used words
publisher	American Society for Microbiology
publishDate	2018
url	https://doaj.org/article/84bb4f7fffc9497a8cbf85dd0ba1a1f9
work_keys_str_mv	AT justinapruneski introducingstudentstothechallengesofcommunicatingsciencebyusingatoolthatemploysonlythe1000mostcommonlyusedwords
_version_	1718428201186754560

Introducing Students to the Challenges of Communicating Science by Using a Tool That Employs Only the 1,000 Most Commonly Used Words

Ejemplares similares