How Words Change Minds: Writing Tips for School Communication

As communicators, we like to gravitate toward verbs. After all, verbs elicit action. They call us to change: Buy this product, enroll in our district, sign up for our newsletter, and tour our schools. The list goes on and on. Obviously, you can’t get away from using verbs in your writing—and they have their place. But some moments allow for a choice. For example, when describing your friend that likes to climb mountains, you could say, “Sara climbs mountains.” Or you could say, “Sara is a mountaineer.” Both statements are true but one hints at identity. Studies show that turning actions into identities can influence behavior. 

James Clear talks about this in his bestselling book, Atomic Habits. “Behind every system of action are a system of beliefs,” he says, in regards to habit formation. He gives the example of two smokers trying to quit. When offered a cigarette, one person might say, “No thanks. I’m trying to quit.” The other might say, “No thanks. I’m not a smoker.” The subtle shift in language transforms the second person’s perception of themselves and thus their actions. 

Turning actions into identities extends beyond habit formation. A perfectly placed noun can influence other people's behavior. In a study done at Bing Nursery School, scientists wanted to know if a subtle shift in language could motivate children to help clean up. They placed a group of children (ranging from three to six years old) in a room full of toys with an adult. As the child played with the toys, the adult would ask them a question. The control group was asked to “help” pick up a mess. The other group was asked to “be a helper” and pick up the mess. Unsurprisingly, the group of kids who heard the noun “helper” helped significantly more than those who were simply asked to “help” clean up. This study proves that kids are intrinsically motivated by identity and will act on this motivation in certain situations.

How does all of this apply to school communications? As you market your district, invite your community to participate in the identity you’re building at your schools. Don’t ask teachers to teach on your careers page or job posting. Ask them to be a teacher in your district. 

Questions to reflect on

1. How can you invite your community to participate in the identity you’re building in your schools?

2. How do you shift your language to reflect that?

Just like some foods are classified as superfoods (offering maximum nutritional benefits), some words are supercharged. They have the power to influence behavior. We use one of these words every day without stopping to think about how powerful it really is: the word because.

A Harvard study conducted by Psychology professor Ellen Langer in 1978, set out to discover if the word “because” could persuade someone to do something for someone else. A researcher on her team was asked to wait near a copier in a library. When someone walked up to use the copier, the researcher would ask to cut in line using one of these three questions:

1. “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the copy machine?”

2. “Excuse me, may I use the copy machine, because I am in a rush?”

3. “Excuse me, may I use the copy machine, because I need to make copies?”

The results were surprising. Question one had a 60% success rate, question two had a 94% success rate, and question three had a 93% success rate. It’s easy to see why question two had the highest success rate; the researcher gave a valid reason for cutting. But the question remains, why did three have such a high success rate? The study concluded that using the word “because”—even if the reason is weak—increases the chances of persuasion. 

“You” is another supercharged word. In Jonah Berger’s book, Magic Words, he discussed a recent experiment he led with his team. They analyzed over a thousand social media posts for a tech company. They found that posts using the pronoun “you”, “your”, or “yourself” increased engagement, likes, and comments. The company responded and began using these words more frequently in their posts. Since then they’ve seen an uptick in social media engagement. 

As a communicator, you’re tasked with persuading your community to take action. This isn’t an easy feat. These requests have a thousand faces, like voting to pass a bond, applying for a position, enrolling, signing up for PTA, volunteering for an event—etc. How are you using supercharged words to grab your community's attention and persuade them to take action?

Questions to reflect on

“You” and “because” aren’t the only supercharged words in the dictionary, but they’re great ones to start out with.

1. Think about a page or campaign you’re wanting to promote. Where can you add the word “because” to get your audience to do what you want them to do?

2. Audit your short-form content, like social media posts, live feed, or news articles. How often do you use the word “you”?

We’ve talked extensively about the importance of customer service and how it’s a vital tool in growing advocates. But we haven’t discussed the role language plays in customer service. One of the best ways to build connections with your school community is through concrete language. 

Concrete language is language that is specific and clear. It’s the exercise of making abstract ideas tangible and accessible to everyone. The benefits of concrete language are numerous. It builds support, grabs attention, and encourages people to take a specific action. 

Imagine this scenario: You’re charged with getting guardians and teachers to sign up as chaperones for an upcoming school dance. You may use a variety of channels to get your message across, like social media posts, flyers, and email blasts.

You could say: “Sign up to be a chaperone for Adaville High’s upcoming school dance in September! If you’re interested, register here.”

Or, you could say: “Parents, guardians, and teachers: We need your help. We’re looking for chaperones to volunteer for Adaville High’s homecoming dance, taking place on September 28th. Use the form below to sign up!”

Both ways of asking for help are correct, but the second way uses concrete language. The audience is clear: parents, guardians, and teachers. The timeline is clear: September 28th. Even the desired action leaves little for interpretation: Use the form below to sign up. The reason this communication method works so well is that your audience doesn’t have to think or go through the process of interpreting what you want them to do. It’s specific and to the point,  which both saves them time in their busy day and helps them understand what you want them to do next. 

Concrete language also increases customer satisfaction because it demonstrates that we’re listening. To illustrate, marketing professor and researcher Grant Packard and Berger teamed up to study retail customer service calls. They wanted to know if linguistic concreteness shaped the outcome of customer satisfaction. What they discovered was interesting. Customers spend 30% more in the following weeks when they spoke to a customer service rep that used concrete language. 

For example, someone might reach out to a customer service rep to inquire about a jacket that hadn’t arrived. An employee could use abstract language like, “The jacket will arrive soon.” Others used concrete language like, “Your Patagonia jacket should arrive at your doorstep either tomorrow or the next day.” No surprise, customers appreciated descriptive language over abstract language. 

If you picture yourself in a scenario like this, you’d probably feel the same way. That’s because descriptive language proves that we’ve not only heard the other person but have also retained the information—so much so that we can speak it back to them. There are so many ways you can apply this in your schools, most notably in parent-teacher communication. One of the best ways teachers can make parents and guardians feel heard is to simply use concrete language. 

There’s a marketing term called the curse of knowledge, which is a cognitive assumption that others know as much as you know. When some is “cursed” with knowledge, they speak in riddles and abstract language. It shows up most often with top executives and visionary leaders. They become so well-versed in the vision of their company that when they talk about it to outsiders or frontline employees, it’s hard to understand. 

For example, a communications team may come up with the slogan: “Adaville School District’s vision and mission is to achieve student success.” But what does that mean? That’s the curse of knowledge. A school leader may know what “student success” means—it’s in their head—but they’ve failed to communicate it clearly with everyone else. 

As a school leader, it’s important to assume that others don’t know what you know. Assume they have no context about what you want or what you’re talking about. Then speak and craft your message accordingly. If you want to change minds, be specific.

Questions to reflect on

1. Think about a current school initiative. Think about the language you’re using to promote that initiative. Ask yourself, “But what does that mean?” Do your frontline employees and students understand what it means?

2. How do you show that you’re listening to your community through the language that you use?

3. Think about an action you want your community to take in the future or present. Example: asking families to enroll in your district. How can you be more specific and concrete with your request?

The last thing I’ll leave you with is a thought I’ve been sitting with recently, which is: If you want something to take off, name it. Gathering with female friends around Valentine's Day isn’t new. But when Leslie Knope of TV’s “Parks and Recreation” coined the term “Galentine’s Day,” it got a name. Similarly, everyone loves a good spa weekend. It feels good to indulge. And if you’re a “Parks and Rec” fan, you probably refer to a good self-care day as “Treat Yo’ Self Day.”

My point is that by naming things that most people participate in, “Parks and Recreation” associated itself with those activities. In other words, by giving a common event or initiative a catchy name, you can promote your own brand in the process.

What is something you want to take off this year? It could be something as simple as an internal brand initiative. Maybe you want all of your staff members to use a Google Drive folder that houses all of your brand assets but the initiative isn’t gaining momentum like you’d hoped. Give it a name—be witty, creative, or even funny and see what happens.