12 Ways To Help Students Retain Science Vocabulary

I remember when I was in fourth grade, and I had Sister Elrita for a teacher. She tried so hard to help us remember our spelling words. We had a special notebook just for spelling tests, and we had weekly lists we needed to take home, but looking back, those lists were just pure memorization. I didn't always know what the words meant, and I wasn't ever even a good speller. I was one of those kids that could see that it looked wrong, but didn't always know how to fix it. I still am that way as an adult. Now, to add vocabulary to the mix, yikes. I would use strategies when I got older such as pneumonic devices, or acrostics to support my memorizing of what a particular word meant. Do you recall how you memorized all of those words and what they meant when you were younger?

Science vocabulary is hard for students to retain. Whether you use the Freyer model or Sitton spelling or a district spelling program, here are some helpful tips to bring your science vocabulary to a new level of retention. What is even harder is that teachers have such little time to teach science in our very busy days and now with social distancing how do you even try to have enough time and supplies for each student. As you find new ways to add science into your curriculum, we also have to remember to focus on hands on and creative ways for our students to know what they are doing and what vocabulary words go with each concept.

You can use vocabulary within the context of a lesson or through a creative activity, but having new ideas to help your students understand those tough tier three words will surely inspire both you and your students!

Here are my top 12 ways that I help my K-5th grade students to remember their science vocabulary words and retain their meaning week to week:

1. Songs/Chants: I love songs and chants to remember vocabulary words. From Water Cycle to states of matter, songs help students remember words through popular songs and chants. 

2. Write the room with qr codes: I have students go from poster to poster reading vocabulary or answering a vocabulary driven question. Now with social distancing I have a bell that allows students to know when to rotate. 

3. Cloze Reading: I might give students a short reading with vocabulary words to focus on that are bolded. When they are done I give them a few questions to answer that allows for them to reflect on the words they are learning.

4. Boom Cards: I absolutely love boom cards for testing for understanding after we focus on a science concept and experiment. I just used mixture or solution and states of matter this week!

5. Word drawings: I use this when we have words that are a bit harder such as the water cycle and identifying the differences or solubility/saturation/concentration/diluted. When the word becomes the concept it makes more sense!

6. Google Slide Vocabulary Review Games: Some of my classes are not set up for Boom Learning because...well I teach over 230 students. I shift those classes to my google slides activities! This allows for them to look at picture association and determine which word represents the vocabulary we are learning. 

Science School Yard Digital Resources

7. Science Experiments and See Saw Activities: I love when I can demonstrate the words and what they mean through an experiment or let students do the experiments independently right now. Once they are done, they work on a record sheet to use what they learned. They have to use the words correctly in sentences or phrases that show what they know and utilize their words in context.

8.  Vocabulary Board Games: I LOVED using these last year as a way to review our FOSS science units. Now that we are virtual and independent we have not been able to use the games this year. Instead, we now I have...who has which can be done at their desk. Kiddos at home review by some of the ideas above.

Science School Yard Science Games

9. Art projects: We utilize science based art projects at times to create a picture or diagram using our colored paper and a concept such as the water cycle or landforms. We then label the picture (or even diorama when we could work in groups) to show what each part of our picture represents.

10. Memory/Go Fish: Okay...another idea that is very hard independently, but Educandy offers a way to play memory, word search and more. Here is the video on how to do just that!

 11. Poetry: I use acrostic poems and haikus to have students remember important science words. We take a picture and add it to see saw for them to use as a study guide, then I gather the poems and create a bulletin board. Two for the price of one!

12. Placemats: I use digital placemats for students to use to fill in the definition, picture, antonyms, and synonyms of the vocabulary words that are the main focus of our lesson. I don't always use this one, because I am crunched for time and this one can take a bit longer for us to fill out. I am sharing my digital placemat for you to download here!   

I hope that these ideas will inspire you to add some science vocabulary activities into your science lessons! Let's make science child's play!