“Once Upon A Star”: A Science Education Program Based on Personification Storytelling in Promoting Preschool Children’s Understanding of Astronomy Concepts

Can Motion Graphic Animation About Snakes Improve Preschoolers’ Detection on Snakes? A Study of Inattentional Blindness

“…A noticeable point regards the strength of MG integrating with storytelling to meet children’s interest as well as stressing the key information. Research suggests that storytelling is an efficient and practical method for nurturing young children’s understanding in abstract scientific concepts in science education ( Hu et al, 2020 ). In fact, there are some attempts to employ storytelling MG animation for popular science programs, such as Cells at Work , that achieved impressive success in both educational and entertainment aspects ( Kakihara et al, 2018 ).…”

Developing Culturally and Developmentally Appropriate Early STEM Learning Experiences

“…It involves creativity, which is also used in Arts and Design projects (McClure et al, 2017), as well as language and social skills when children are communicating and collaborating. Although Hu et al (2020) and Stites et al (2020) studies have linked science and mathematics to reading activities, more studies are needed to explore the connections between STEM and other learning domains for young children, as young children should learn and develop in an integrated, holistic manner. For example, future studies could explore how communication and collaboration can promote engagement in STEM learning and can influence children's social-emotional development.…”

“…Many studies in this special issue have presented good practices related to early STEM curriculum and pedagogy (Gold et al, 2020;Hu et al, 2020;Stites et al, 2020;Wang et al, 2020), as well as STEM PD programs designed for pre-service teachers (Sheridan & Wen, 2020). However, none of them had conducted true experiments or rigorous program evaluation to assess the effectiveness of these practices.…”

“…Early STEM Curriculum and Pedagogy Hu et al (2020) article, "'Once upon a star': A science education program based on personification storytelling in promoting preschool children's understanding of astronomy concepts," opens this special issue with a science education intervention study aiming to foster preschool children's conceptual understanding of astronomy in Sydney, Australia. In this intervention study, personification storytelling was employed as the pedagogical approach that incorporates scientific concepts into stories and integrates hands-on activities and free drawing into early science learning.…”

“…In this intervention study, personification storytelling was employed as the pedagogical approach that incorporates scientific concepts into stories and integrates hands-on activities and free drawing into early science learning. Based on Vygotsky's sociocultural approach to examining children's conceptual understanding, Hu et al (2020) analyses of pre-and post-intervention interviews, teachers' documents, and children's work samples demonstrated the benefits of the nine-week science program for 24 children aged 4-5 years. Although using a pre-experimental design, this study showed the potential of using personification storytelling as an effective strategy to introduce abstract scientific concepts to young children.…”