Getting an early start in science: An activity for teaching psychology to preschoolers

Recently, a local childcare center invited me to teach psychology to preschoolers (ages 3-5 years) as part of their STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) education week. The opportunity to teach psychology as a science to a young audience — perhaps even before they formed stereotypes about the discipline — appealed to me.

Because this opportunity required a method different from my typical approach to teaching college-level students, I reached out for help. To get started, I reached out to the Society for the Teaching of Psychology’s (STP) Facebook members to get ideas for topics (for the discussion, see Naufel, 2018). The STP Facebook group provided many wonderful ideas, and I felt that the suggestions to cover emotions (from Boyatzis; Gruber; Kantor; Knowles; Mueller; Robinson; 2018) were ideal. Preschool-aged children are developing an understanding of emotions (Denham & Kochanoff, 2002), which makes the subject suitable for this age group. Then, I chatted with a preschool teacher (Salena Calhoun, Sept. 19, 2018, personal communication) and watched a few episodes of PBS Kids Sid the Science Kid¹ to get ideas for how to teach preschoolers. From there, I created an activity that introduced students to psychology as a science.

The activity involved the children first reviewing some basic emotions. Then, they viewed a stimulus and responded with what emotion they would feel if they encountered that stimulus. The activity and experience were both enjoyable, and I am looking forward to opportunities to doing it again. For those wishing to recreate the activity, feel free to use the recipe that follows.

A recipe for a psychology as STEM activity for preschoolers

• Prep time: 30-60 minutes once materials are gathered.
• Class time: 10-20 minutes.
• Serves: 6-24 children.

Materials needed

• Four pieces of light-colored poster board.
• 8 X 11 print outs of each of five emotions (I used emoticons of happy, sad, angry, disgust and fear from Freepik.com).
• Four small pictures of five faces expressing five different emotions.
• Four stimuli that would elicit different emotions (I chose pictures of a cupcake, broccoli, a snake, an empty box from Pixabay.com).
• Optional: Each child can receive a set of five note cards with five different faces on it.

Creating the stimuli (See Figure 1)

• Glue a stimulus picture at the top of the poster board.
• Glue the five emotion pictures below it.
• Draw a line to indicate columns between the different emotions.

Implementing the activity

1. Have the children sit where they can all see the poster board clearly.
2. Briefly explain what psychology is and tie it into the upcoming activity. (Example: “I am an experimental psychologist. Psychologists do science to study thinking, behaving and feeling. Today, we are going to talk about how people feel.”)
3. Review the five emotions. Hold up one of the 8 X 11 pictures of the emoticons and ask the children what emotion it is. Then, have the children make that face. This step teaches children about basic emotions.
4. Next, discuss how emotions can change as a result of different experiences. Specifically, ask children, “Imagine that you opened a box. Inside, you found a {the stimulus name}. How would you feel?” As children indicate their emotion, make a tally in the appropriate column. (Alternatively, if you do not wish for children to provide their answer vocally, you can have them select a picture from their stack of note cards and turn in a picture of the emotion directly to you.)
5. Tally the responses for the stimuli. Have the children join you in counting how many classmates chose each emotion.
6. Count aloud how many classmates chose each emotion. Then, compare how many classmates chose each emotion for each stimulus. Counting and comparison language are a part of a preschool science curriculum that can help build mathematical and scientific understanding (Gelman, Brenneman, MacDonald & Román, 2010).
7. Repeat steps four to six with the other stimuli. Discuss how emotions changed as the stimuli changed.
8. End the class by linking psychological science to the activity. (Example: “An experimental psychologist may look at how people react to different things. They might look to see what makes most people happy. Or, they might look at why some things make some people happy and some people sad.”)
   
   

¹ When preparing this manuscript, I obtained the book Preschool Pathways to Science (PrePs)^TM (Gelman et al., 2010), which was what PBS Kids Sid the Science Kid uses. It contains a curriculum and activities for teaching science to this age group, and it may be helpful in designing other psychological science activities for preschoolers.

Figure 1. Sample stimulus sheet.

References

Boyatzis, C.  (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Denham, S., & Kochanoff, A.T. (2002). Parental contributions to preschoolers' understanding of emotion. Marriage & Family Review, 34, 311-343. https://doi.org/10.1300/J002v34n03_06.

Gelman, R., Brenneman, K., MacDonald, G., & Román, M. (2010). Preschool pathways to science (PrePS): Facilitating scientific ways of thinking, talking, doing and understanding. Baltimore; Paul H. Brookes Publishing Company.

Gruber, A. C.  (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Kantor, T. T. (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Knowles, E.  (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Mueller, J. (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Naufel, K. (2018, Sept. 19). Posts [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

Robinson, S.  (2018, Sept. 19). Post comment [Facebook page]. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/groups/teachpsych/search/?query=Naufel&epa=FILTERS&filters=eyJycF9hdXRob3IiOiJ7XCJuYW1lXCI6XCJhdXRob3JfbWVcIixcImFyZ3NcIjpcIlwifSJ9.

About the author

Karen Z. Naufel, PhD, is a professor at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, Georgia. Her research interests are in the domain of applied social cognition. She also has strong interests in the ethics of research, increasing public understanding of psychological science, and the scholarship of teaching and learning, At the undergraduate level, her favorite courses to teach include introductory psychology, cognitive psychology, psychology of evil and health psychology. At the graduate level, her favorite courses to teach include research design and seminar in teaching psychology. Her accomplishments in teaching have been recognized at the university level, with the 2014-15 Award for Excellence in Instruction and nationally, with the 2010 Jane S. Halonen Early Career Teaching Award from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology.