What is a language scrapbook?
Voices are powerful vehicles for remembering. A language scrapbook retraces your child’s development through a series of short recordings. These are tagged with who, what, when, and where it's said. Over time, you will make a timeline of your child’s changing speech.
You can share your scrapbook with family who live far away. This is useful during social distancing. Also, children's speech changes as they mature and learn more language, so your scrapbook offers a bird’s eye-view of their development. Language scrapbooking is a fun activity for children ages 1 to 8 years. Take turns describing pictures on the scrapbook or capture spontaneous moments as they unfold.
What is Citizen Science?
COVID-19 has radically altered families' lives. Rather than at schools or on playgrounds, children are at home with family. We’re doing our part to keep each other safe, but how is social distancing affecting children’s learning environments?
We’re asking parents to help us answer this by making short recordings of interactions with their children. Our goal is to understand what lives are like for 6 million families, across different geographical locations and different social and economic backgrounds. Together, we will create knowledge that will help policymakers to support families after COVID-19.
Language scrapbooking is also a way to learn more about the science of language and child development. We will combine your data with those of others, and send out updates about our findings.
Be a Citizen Scientist. Share this call with others who want to contribute to language research and COVID-19 solutions.
