Preschool Science at Home: PEEP Family Science Apps Help Low-Income families Engage in Digital Learning

A growing body of research points to the importance of engaging children in science from an early age, for both their future trajectories in science careers and school readiness. For some children, preschool provides the chance to engage in meaningful science learning. But, for the 46% of American 3- and 4-year-olds who do not attend preschool, opportunities for science enrichment are limited. For such children, accessing science experiences depends almost entirely on parents. However, many parents have limited experience supporting such learning.

To help these parents and their young children do more science together, public media producers at WGBH and researchers at the Education Development Center (EDC) set out to design and test a media-based intervention based on the Emmy Award-winning preschool science series PEEP and the Big Wide World. Funded by the National Science Foundation, the intervention’s design was based on the premise that media has the promise to be a powerful tool to model scientific thinking and practices, foster reflection, and engage and motivate children and adults alike. A particular focus of the R&D process was to ensure low-income families could use the resources without any special materials or new technology.