24 Nov ‘Virus’: the ‘Children’s Word of the Year’ shows the pandemic has impacted us all

This year’s shortlisted words provide valuable insights into the minds of school-aged children during the COVID-19 pandemic

After a disrupted school year of remote learning and virtual classrooms during the COVID-19 lockdowns, it’s not surprising that Australian students have voted for ‘virus’ as the Oxford Australian 2020 Children’s Word of the Year (CWOTY).

Report at a glance:

• After a disrupted school year of remote learning and virtual classrooms during the COVID-19 lockdowns, it’s not surprising that Australian students have voted for ‘virus’ as the Oxford Australian 2020 Children’s Word of the Year
• The second-place contender for the CWOTY was ‘friends’. Along with words like ‘school’ and ‘fun’, the analysis showed that while studying from home, children yearned for social connections that are hard to substitute outside of the classroom environment
• On the other side of the coin, words such as ‘zombies’, ‘lockdown’ and ‘shocked’ showed remarkable popularity this year with students drawing on the challenges that Australia’s young people have faced
• CWOTYs like ‘creativity’ in 2018 and ‘bravery’ in 2019 are a clear contrast to the word ‘virus’ which elicits feelings of concern
• The word ‘equality’ was chosen in 2017, the same year as the marriage equality plebiscite. Both ‘equality’ and ‘virus’ can be seen as indicative of growing social awareness in school-aged children
• Children’s language experts analysed more than 50,000 short stories written by three million Australian children in years 3-8 to compile this year’s shortlist

Children’s language experts analysed more than 50,000 short stories written by three million Australian children for this year’s Storyathon writing events. Students in years 3-8 voted on shortlisted words which included ‘friends’, ‘virus’, ‘zombies’, ‘lockdown’, ‘fun’, ‘world’, ‘shocked’, ‘school’ and ‘people’, to determine the 2020 CWOTY.

Anne Bayetto, Literacy expert at Flinders University, highlighted the word usage of ‘virus’ had increased by 15232% compared to 2019!

“In previous years, students may have occasionally used the word ‘virus’ in science-fiction texts. This year ‘virus’ was clearly top of mind as students were concerned about the immediate and long-term impact,” Ms Bayetto said.

“Perhaps being able to write about the virus was therapeutic, as students were able to voice their concerns through a creative medium.”

The complete shortlist of words paints a vivid picture of life during the pandemic for Australian children.

“The second-place contender for the CWOTY was ‘friends’. Along with words like ‘school’ and ‘fun’, the analysis showed that while studying from home, children yearned for social connections that are hard to substitute outside of the classroom environment,” Ms Bayetto said.

“On the other side of the coin, words such as ‘zombies’, ‘lockdown’ and ‘shocked’ showed remarkable popularity this year with students drawing on the challenges that Australia’s young people have faced.”

Ms Bayetto also noted the 2020 CWOTY – virus – is a noticeable departure from previous years.

“The words selected in the past three years of the CWOTY program have demonstrated a distinctly more positive insight into the language use of children. Words like ‘creativity’ in 2018 and ‘bravery’ in 2019 are a clear contrast to the word ‘virus’ which elicits feelings of concern,” Ms Bayetto said.

“However, this is not the first time we have seen the social conscience of Australian children play out in their CWOTY choice. The word ‘equality’ was chosen in 2017, the same year as the marriage equality plebiscite. Both ‘equality’ and ‘virus’ can be seen as indicative of growing social awareness in school-aged children.”

The CWOTY initiative is currently in its fourth year, however 2020 is the first year to benefit from the partnership with Storyathon, Australia’s largest online story writing event. Lee Walker, Director of Publishing at Oxford University Press, spoke about the CWOTY research.

“It has been truly fascinating to examine the stories over the course of the year and be able to analyse language use at such a pivotal time,” Ms Walker said.

“In our analysis, we noted a surge in students writing about what was happening in the world, namely the pandemic, which ultimately has impacted almost everyone around the world in some way, shape or form.”

The words collected as part of CWOTY have been added to the Oxford Australian Children’s language Corpus – a collection of texts which records the development of children’s linguistics over time and informs Oxford University Press’s research and assessment of children’s language trends.

For more information about the Oxford Australian Children’s Word of the Year, visit Oxford University Press.