ADHD glossary: clear terms, practical family perspectives

Read freely, start small

Every guide here is public and readable without registration. Start with the term that answers today’s question. The practical exercises are optional suggestions, not diagnosis, treatment, or a substitute for qualified advice.

Related guides

• Ableism: describe the disability-related assumption or exclusion

  The APA Dictionary uses ableism for discrimination against disabled people and for prejudice or negative stereotyping directed toward them.

• Absolute risk: ask how often, among whom, and over what time

  The National Cancer Institute describes absolute risk as the chance of a particular event; its cancer example specifies a period of time.

• Action item: turn an agreed next step into a clear record

  An action item is a specific piece of work identified for someone to do after a conversation or review.

• Active listening: check the request before answering it

  We use active listening here to mean giving attention to what someone is communicating and checking that we have understood before responding.

• ADHD accommodations at home: a practical support plan

  Turn one everyday difficulty into a home support conversation, with a completed packing example and space for the child, parent, sibling, and partner's views.

• Adolescence: an age convention is not an ability judgment

  The World Health Organization describes adolescence as the period between childhood and adulthood and uses ages 10 through 19 for that period.

• Alternative text: describe what the image contributes

  W3C's Images Tutorial describes text alternatives as communicating an image's information or function, with the wording depending on the image's purpose and context.

• Ambivalence: two feelings about the same possibility

  One meaning of ambivalence in the APA Dictionary is having contradictory feelings or attitudes toward the same person, object, event, or situation at the same time.

• Anecdote: respect one story without making it everybody's result

  Journalism educator Nicole Kraft describes anecdotes as short stories about real people or incidents and distinguishes reported anecdotes from invented hypothetical scenes.

• Annotation: put your question beside the part you are reading

  An annotation is a note or mark connected to a particular part of a text, image, or other material.

• Appointment agenda: choose what you want to discuss

  An appointment agenda is a short list of topics and questions you want to bring to a scheduled conversation.

• Archive: state what you are keeping outside the active work

  For this household exercise, an archive is a collection of material people choose to retain outside their current working set.

• Assertive communication

  In this ordinary household context, assertive communication means saying your own request, preference, or limit clearly while leaving room for the other person to answer.

• Assignment brief: find the actual task before planning the work

  An assignment brief sets out the work someone is being asked to produce.

• Assistive technology: products and the services around them

  The World Health Organization uses assistive technology as an umbrella category covering assistive products together with their related systems and services.

• Asynchronous communication: people can participate at different times

  Columbia's online-learning guidance describes an asynchronous setting in which students interact with one another and the instructor at different times.

• Automaticity: specify what “automatic” means

  Moors and De Houwer describe automaticity as a concept analyzed through features such as intention, awareness, attention demands, and speed.

• Autonomy: say who is making this choice

  The National Library of Medicine's personal-autonomy entry centers on freedom to direct oneself, particularly independence in moral matters.

• Availability: say what time and involvement you can offer

  Availability describes when, or to what extent, someone is able to take part.

• Backup: an extra copy with recovery in view

  NIST's cybersecurity glossary includes a definition of backup as a copy of files and programs made for possible recovery.

• Backward planning: map earlier steps from a chosen finish date

  Backward planning, in this practical guide, means starting with a chosen finished state and date, then working toward the earlier actions and decisions it needs.

• Belonging: a place on the list is not the same as feeling accepted

  The APA Dictionary uses belonging for the feeling of acceptance and approval within a group or society.

• Blinding: ask who did not know which option was being evaluated

  In its definition of a blinded study, the National Cancer Institute describes patients, or patients and their doctors, not knowing which treatment is being given.

• Body doubling for ADHD: a practical guide for home

  Choose a body-doubling setup for chores, homework, or paperwork. Includes a completed session example, a simple invitation, privacy choices, and family perspectives.

• Bookmark: save a destination and your reason for returning

  A bookmark is a saved reference to a place you want to revisit.

• Boredom: hear the experience before guessing its cause

  The APA Dictionary describes boredom as a weary, unengaged state in relation to the surrounding stimulation.

• Buffer time

  Buffer time is a margin deliberately left unassigned between parts of a plan.

• Calendar invitation: make the event request clear before someone accepts

  A calendar invitation is a request for someone to take part in an event at a stated time.

• Captions: text that follows the audio

  W3C's media guidance describes captions as text aligned with audio, representing speech and the non-speech sounds needed to understand the content.

• Causation: notice when a claim says one thing produced another

  The Australian Bureau of Statistics uses causation for a cause-and-effect relationship in which one event occurs as a result of another.

• Check-in: choose a small time to revisit an agreement

  Here, a check-in is a brief, agreed conversation about an ordinary arrangement: whether it still fits and what needs changing.

• Checklist: decide what each checkmark means

  A checklist is a written set of items that someone can mark as checked.

• Child development: a broad subject, not a scorecard

  The National Library of Medicine's child-development heading covers physical and psychological maturation from birth to the period before adolescence.

• Chore roster: show the recurring work people have agreed to share

  A chore roster is a record of recurring household jobs and the people assigned or agreed to them.

• Chunking: identify what is being grouped

  In its memory-related sense, the APA Dictionary describes chunking as organizing information into smaller units, with one unit able to represent several associated items.

• Clarifying question: ask about the part that is still unclear

  A clarifying question asks about a particular point you do not yet understand.

• Co-regulation examples for families: company, space, and check-ins

  Explore an attributed co-regulation definition and practical conversation examples, including a parent with ADHD, a teen asking for space, and a two-home handoff.

• Cognitive flexibility examples: a family Plan A / Plan B guide

  Read an attributed cognitive-flexibility definition, then explore a completed family backup plan and simple scripts for a sudden change or an interrupted task.

• Cognitive load: describe the information demand without scoring a person

  The University at Buffalo's teaching guide uses cognitive load for the amount of information being processed in working memory at a given time.

• Collaboration

  Collaboration means working with other people on a shared piece of work, with an agreed way to contribute and make decisions.

• Compromise

  A compromise is an arrangement people choose when they accept something different from their original preferences so they can make a shared plan.

• Concept map: put a relationship on the connecting line

  Cañas and Novak describe a concept map as a diagram of concepts whose connecting labels state the relationships between them.

• Confidence interval: read the estimate and its uncertainty together

  NIST explains a 95% confidence interval through repeated sampling: under the method's assumptions, intervals constructed this way would contain the true population parameter in about 95% of repeated samples.

• Conflict of interest: read the disclosure without inventing a verdict

  The ICMJE describes a conflict of interest as a situation in which a secondary interest could influence professional judgment about a primary interest, while noting that a relationship does not always amount to problematic influence.

• Confounding: ask about a shared cause behind a comparison

  In its guidance on non-randomized intervention studies, Cochrane describes confounding as arising when shared causes influence both the intervention chosen and the outcome being examined.

• Contact list: keep the right details for an agreed purpose

  A contact list is a record of people or organizations and ways to reach them.

• Contingency plan: agree on an ordinary fallback

  A contingency plan, in our everyday planning example, is a stated fallback for a particular change in circumstances.

• Control group: ask what the comparison actually received

  In clinical-trial terminology, the National Cancer Institute describes a control group as the comparison group that does not receive the new treatment being studied.

• Coping: describe the response someone chose

  The National Library of Medicine uses coping skills for ways of actively handling a stressful situation or event.

• Correlation: describe the relationship without adding a cause

  The Australian Bureau of Statistics describes correlation as a numerical description of a relationship's strength and direction, not by itself evidence of cause and effect.

• Cross-sectional study: what one time slice can describe

  The National Library of Medicine's MeSH vocabulary describes cross-sectional studies as studies in which health-related variables are determined in a population or sample at a particular time.

• Data visualization: read the labels before the picture tells a story

  The Office for National Statistics organizes its data-visualization guidance around charts, tables, chart choices, colors and maps.

• Deadline: make the required time and finished state clear

  A deadline is the time by which a specified piece of work is due.

• Decision log: record the choice and what remains open

  A decision log is a record of practical choices and the context participants want to keep.

• Decision-making: separate the options, criteria, and actual choice

  The National Library of Medicine describes decision making as judging among complex alternatives involving several variables, usually to settle on a course of action or an idea.

• Decluttering: choose what moves and leave uncertain belongings alone

  Decluttering, as we use it here, means making deliberate choices about which belongings stay in a particular space and which may move elsewhere.

• Decoding: clarify when a reading conversation is about print and sound

  One definition in the International Literacy Association’s glossary describes decoding as using knowledge of a writing system, especially letter–sound patterns, to turn print into speech.

• Definition of done: agree what finishing this task means

  A definition of done is a description of what will count as completing a task.

• Delay discounting: read the timing question without labeling a person

  The National Library of Medicine's delay-discounting scope note includes the tendency for an outcome to be valued less as the wait for it increases.

• Delegation: hand over a defined task, not an unspoken bundle

  Delegation involves passing a task or part of a responsibility to someone else.

• Denominator: out of how many, and out of what?

  OpenStax identifies the denominator as the lower number in a fraction and, for a fraction describing parts of one whole, explains it as the number of equal parts into which that whole is divided.

• Dependency: what a task is waiting for

  In planning, we use dependency to mean something that needs to happen or become available before another piece of work can proceed as intended.

• Differentiated instruction: ask what is being adjusted

  The IRIS Center describes differentiated instruction as an approach in which teachers adjust curriculum and instruction for learners, using a framework rather than a single strategy.

• Digital folder: agree which files belong together

  A digital folder is a named grouping for files.

• Digital notifications

  Digital notifications are notices presented by an app or device, such as an alert about a message or a scheduled event.

• Disclosure: deciding what personal information to share

  Disclosure, in this everyday communication guide, means telling someone personal information they did not already know.

• Divided attention: name the demands without assuming multitasking success

  Université Laval's Interactive BRAIN resource uses divided attention for attending to more than one thing at the same time.

• Division of household labor

  Division of household labor means how household work is distributed among people.

• Do not disturb: agree on a quiet period and a clear return

  “Do not disturb” can be a request to let an ordinary conversation or interruption wait.

• Drop zone

  A drop zone, sometimes called a landing zone, is an agreed place for a limited set of things when people arrive, leave, or hand something over.

• Effect size: how much, measured in what?

  The Cochrane Handbook notes that “effect size” is sometimes used specifically for a standardized mean difference and sometimes more generally for an effect estimate, so its meaning depends on the measure being reported.

• Emotion labeling: use your own words for a feeling

  Burklund and colleagues describe affect labeling as naming emotional content or one's own emotional response in words.

• Emotion regulation: what happens with a feeling

  The National Library of Medicine uses emotion regulation for influencing features of an emotional response, including its strength, duration, and expression.

• Emotional labor: distinguish feeling demands from keeping track of tasks

  In a 2014 interview published by the International Sociological Association, Arlie Hochschild discusses emotional labor as managing feelings to meet the emotional expectations of a job, particularly in service interactions.

• Empathy: understanding is not a score

  The APA Dictionary uses empathy for understanding someone within that person's frame of reference, or for experiencing their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts indirectly.

• Errand planning

  Errand planning is deciding what a trip is for, which stops belong on it, and what each stop requires.

• Evidence: what supports the statement you are reading?

  The UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology distinguishes research evidence by its collection and analysis through a research process, rather than treating it as interchangeable with hearsay or opinion.

• Executive function: understand the umbrella term without scoring a person

  Harvard's Center on the Developing Child describes executive function and self-regulation together as capacities for managing information, attention, distractions, and changes of mental approach.

• Explicit instruction: making the teaching approach clear

  In its mathematics module, the IRIS Center describes explicit instruction as teaching a particular concept or procedure through an organized, systematic approach.

• External memory aid: an intention recorded outside memory

  In their review of intention offloading, Gilbert and colleagues describe physical and digital tools outside a person's own memory that carry prompts for intended future actions.

• Feedback

  Feedback, in this page's ordinary task context, is information you offer about a piece of work or an action, in relation to a stated purpose.

• File-naming convention: agree what each part of a name means

  A file-naming convention is an agreed pattern for naming files.

• Follow-up: return to one identified open question

  A follow-up is a return to an earlier conversation or unfinished item.

• Formative assessment: information used during learning

  Carnegie Mellon’s Eberly Center describes formative assessment as monitoring learning to provide ongoing feedback that instructors and students can use to adjust their work.

• Frustration: name the blocked intention

  The National Library of Medicine describes frustration as an emotional or motivational state associated with an intention being obstructed, or with disappointment or defeat.

• Generalizability: does this result address our situation?

  The National Academies describes generalizability as the extent to which results apply in populations or settings beyond those originally studied.

• Goal setting

  Goal setting means choosing an outcome you want to work toward and making clear what that outcome means to you.

• Graphic organizer

  A graphic organizer is a layout that shows how chosen pieces of information relate.

• Guilt: a feeling is not a verdict

  The National Library of Medicine describes guilt as the subjective sense of having done something wrong, including uncomfortable self-criticism about conduct or thoughts that conflict with one's conscience.

• Habit: distinguish an automatic action from a written routine

  NIMH's research framework describes habits as triggered motor or cognitive behaviors that can continue without continual conscious supervision.

• Household handoff: pass the task's status, not a guess

  A household handoff is the transfer of agreed practical information when another person takes the next part of an ordinary task.

• Household inventory: record what is present before deciding what is needed

  A household inventory is a record of selected belongings or supplies currently present in a household.

• Household meeting: discuss one issue and record what is still open

  A household meeting is a planned conversation about a shared practical matter.

• Hyperfocus: describing absorption without turning it into a diagnosis

  In their 2019 review, Ashinoff and Abu-Akel discuss hyperfocus as intense absorption in an activity with reduced awareness of surrounding events, while emphasizing variation in how the term had been defined.

• Hypothesis: a proposed explanation, not an established answer

  The National Cancer Institute describes a hypothesis as a provisional explanation for observations that still needs investigation.

• ICD-11: what the name means and what to ask

  A WHO-attributed explanation of the ICD-11 name, plus a practical question card for a term you encounter in paperwork. No diagnosis, coding, or eligibility advice.

• Identity development: leaving room for a changing account of yourself

  In his account of self and identity, psychologist Dan P. McAdams describes narrative identity as an evolving personal story connecting remembered experience with an imagined future.

• Identity language: ask whose wording is being chosen

  The NIH Style Guide distinguishes person-first wording, which presents a condition as one part of a person, from identity-first wording, which can express a characteristic as integral to identity.

• Implementation intention: what an if–then plan specifies

  Gollwitzer and Sheeran describe implementation intentions as if–then plans that connect a specified situation with an intended response, distinguishing them from statements of the goal itself.

• Inhibitory control: understand the term without judging the person

  Adele Diamond's review describes inhibitory control as regulating attention, actions, thoughts, or feelings so that a strong tendency or outside distraction does not determine the response.

• Intention–action gap: describe the missing step without guessing a motive

  Gollwitzer and Sheeran distinguish forming a goal intention from attaining that goal in their chapter on implementation intentions.

• Interdependence: connected contributions without identical roles

  The APA Dictionary describes interdependence as a relationship in which people or other entities rely on or respond to one another, so that a change in one affects another.

• Interleaving: arranging different practice material together

  Cornell’s Learning Strategies Center describes interleaving as practicing several related skills or concepts in an alternating arrangement, returning to earlier material rather than completing only one kind at a time.

• Interruption: a break in an ongoing activity

  Draxler and colleagues define an interruption in mobile learning as a break in a primary task when another activity takes the person's attention.

• Intersectionality: notice what separate categories can leave out

  In her 1989 essay, Kimberlé Crenshaw centers Black women's experiences to challenge analyses that treat race and gender as separate, mutually exclusive categories.

• Language development: name the domain without setting a deadline

  The National Library of Medicine describes language development as increasing complexity and meaning in a person's understanding of symbols and sounds through maturation and learning.

• Learning objective: separate the intended learning from the activity

  Carnegie Mellon’s Eberly Center describes learning objectives as statements of the knowledge or skills students are intended to acquire by a course’s end.

• Lived experience: hear the account without making it stand for everyone

  In its work on engagement around noncommunicable diseases and mental health and neurological conditions, the World Health Organization uses lived experience for first-hand experience of living with or being affected by those conditions, and recognizes it as a form of expertise.

• Loneliness: being alone does not tell the whole story

  The APA Dictionary presents several perspectives on loneliness, including a cognitive account emphasizing an unpleasant gap between the relationships a person wants and those they perceive they have.

• Long-term memory: retained knowledge and earlier experiences

  In his 2008 review, Nelson Cowan describes long-term memory as retained knowledge and records of earlier events.

• Longitudinal study: follow the observations across time

  The National Library of Medicine describes longitudinal studies as studies that assess variables in an individual or group over a period of time.

• Maintenance schedule: plan when to revisit ordinary upkeep

  A maintenance schedule records when agreed upkeep should be revisited and who is handling it.

• Meal planning: coordinate the meal without making a food rule

  Meal planning is deciding the practical arrangements around upcoming meals: who expects to be there, what people would like, who is handling shopping and preparation, and what remains undecided.

• Mean: find the total and count behind an average

  The Australian Bureau of Statistics explains the arithmetic mean as the total of the observed values divided by how many observations there are.

• Measurement reliability: consistency is one question, not every question

  The Office of Research Integrity presents reliability as consistency in a measurement method when it is used to measure the same thing.

• Measurement validity: are we measuring what the label says?

  The Office of Research Integrity introduces measurement validity by asking whether an instrument or method measures what it is intended to measure.

• Median: locate the middle without losing the rest of the picture

  The Australian Bureau of Statistics defines the median using values put in order: the middle observation for an odd count, or the arithmetic mean of the two middle observations for an even count.

• Meeting agenda: share the questions before the conversation

  A meeting agenda is a shared outline of what people propose to discuss at a planned conversation.

• Mental load: name the household thinking work

  A University of Bath account uses mental load for the thinking involved in organizing household life, including arranging schedules and planning tasks.

• Meta-analysis: ask which results were combined

  Cochrane's handbook describes meta-analysis as using statistical methods to combine results from at least two separate studies.

• Metacognition: ask what you notice about your own thinking

  The National Library of Medicine describes metacognition as being aware of and understanding one's own thinking processes.

• Milestone: a checkpoint in a longer plan

  A milestone, in this planning guide, is a recognizable point reached during a larger piece of work.

• Mind-wandering: keep the research definition visible

  Seli and colleagues describe mind-wandering as a broad family of experiences.

• Missing data: an empty entry is not a measured zero

  The Cochrane Handbook describes several forms of missing information in research reviews, including absent studies, unreported outcomes, unavailable summary statistics and participants not represented in reported results.

• Mixed methods: how the numbers and accounts connect

  Creswell and colleagues' report for NIH OBSSR describes mixed methods as research that intentionally integrates quantitative and qualitative approaches to address its questions, rather than merely keeping both kinds of material side by side.

• Motivation: ask about the person's reasons before supplying your own

  The National Library of Medicine uses motivation for factors that prompt action directed toward a goal or satisfaction.

• Motor development: discuss movement without testing a child

  Maine's Department of Education describes motor development as the development of physical abilities and separates fine-motor and gross-motor areas of focus.

• Mutual aid: support organized with the people involved

  In his 2020 essay, Dean Spade describes mutual aid as collective support within social movements, joining the work of meeting needs with solidarity and participant-directed organizing.

• Negotiation

  Negotiation, in an ordinary household arrangement, is discussing different requests and possible terms to see whether people want to agree on a plan.

• Neurodevelopment: keep a technical term at the right scale

  In its 2026 terminology record, the National Library of Medicine uses neurodevelopment for the developmental process involving neurons extending and forming synapses.

• Neurodiversity: distinguish variation from an individual label

  In scholar Nick Walker's terminology, neurodiversity concerns variation across human minds; neurodivergent describes substantial differences from dominant societal expectations for neurocognitive functioning, while neurotypical describes functioning within those expectations.

• Neuroplasticity: a definition is not a product promise

  The National Library of Medicine lists neuroplasticity under neuronal plasticity, whose definition concerns the nervous system's capacity for a changed response following repeated activation.

• Note-taking

  Note-taking means recording selected information for a purpose you choose.

• Numeracy: keep the numbers connected to their meaning and context

  For PIAAC Cycle 2, the National Center for Education Statistics describes numeracy in terms of accessing, using, and critically reasoning with mathematical information in varied adult-life situations.

• Observational study: ask what researchers watched and measured

  The National Cancer Institute describes an observational study as observing people or measuring outcomes without trying to change the outcome.

• Office hours: prepare one question for an instructor's contact time

  Here, office hours means a teacher's or instructor's stated time for questions or conversation.

• Open-ended question: leave room for the person's own answer

  An open-ended question leaves space for an answer beyond a fixed yes, no, or listed choice.

• Opportunity cost: what is the next-best option you leave behind?

  Federal Reserve Education explains opportunity cost as the most highly valued alternative given up when a choice is made, rather than all the alternatives added together.

• Organization: agree where materials belong and how to find them

  Vanderbilt's IRIS Center discusses materials organization in terms of arranging school items and being able to locate needed papers or information.

• Outlier: investigate an unusual value before explaining it away

  NIST's statistical handbook describes an outlier as an observation unusually far from other values in a random sample, with the meaning of “unusual” requiring context.

• Outline: choose a structure before filling in every sentence

  An outline is a planned arrangement of the main parts of a piece of work.

• Overwhelm: let the person explain what feels too much

  In their workplace study, Dael, Meister, and Krings use overwhelm for an emotional state at the point where a person perceives demands as exceeding the resources available to them.

• Packing list: choose what belongs in this bag

  A packing list, in this guide, names the items chosen for a particular bag, trip, or activity.

• Paraphrasing: restate the passage without losing its meaning or source

  Purdue OWL describes paraphrasing as expressing a source passage in your own wording while still attributing it to that source.

• Peer pressure: identify the group influence being described

  The APA Dictionary describes peer pressure as influence from a peer group toward fitting its members to the group's expectations or norms.

• Peer review: ask what kind of checking occurred

  The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors describes journal peer review as experts' critical evaluation of submitted manuscripts, usually by people outside the editorial staff.

• Percentage point: distinguish a difference from a percent change

  The UK's Office for National Statistics uses percentage points to express the difference between percentages.

• Perfectionism: separate a standard from a label

  The National Library of Medicine describes perfectionism in terms of pursuing an absence of flaws, demanding excessively high performance, judging oneself harshly, and concern about other people's judgments.

• Personal boundaries: say what you can and cannot offer

  Personal boundaries, in this everyday guide, are the limits someone states about their own availability, participation, possessions, or sharing of personal information.

• Personal privacy

  Personal privacy, in this ordinary household discussion, concerns preferences and agreements about personal information, belongings, and space: what someone wants others to ask about before reading, moving, or sharing.

• Perspective-taking: consider a viewpoint without claiming to know it

  The APA Dictionary describes perspective taking as considering a situation from a viewpoint other than one's usual one, including another person's perspective or a social role.

• Phonological awareness: a term about the sounds within spoken words

  An Institute of Education Sciences article describes phonological awareness as noticing and working with the sound structure of spoken words, including units such as syllables.

• Placebo: find out what the study actually compared

  The National Cancer Institute defines a placebo as an inactive substance or other intervention made to resemble and be administered like the active substance or intervention being compared.

• Plagiarism: make the source of work visible

  The University of Oxford's definition of plagiarism includes presenting another source's work or ideas as your own without fully acknowledging that source.

• Planning: connect a chosen result to the steps and decisions before it

  Stanford's graduate project-planning guidance connects an intended goal with milestones, specific tasks, and intended work dates.

• Play: leave room for enjoyment without an assignment

  The National Library of Medicine describes play in terms of freely chosen or spontaneous recreation pursued for enjoyment; its heading also covers objects used in play.

• Preprint: name the version before sharing the claim

  The National Library of Medicine defines a preprint as a scientific manuscript shared before peer review.

• Preregistration: what was planned before the results?

  The Center for Open Science describes preregistration as specifying a research plan in advance and submitting it to a registry; its guidance also includes plans recorded before analyzing an existing dataset.

• Prerequisite: ask what earlier learning a course assumes

  The MIT Registrar uses prerequisite to indicate a subject’s place in a sequence and the earlier knowledge on which it is expected to build.

• Primary source: find the record behind the retelling

  The U.S. National Archives introduces primary sources as records made by people who took part in or witnessed past events.

• Prioritization: choose what comes first and what can wait

  Prioritization means choosing an order among competing tasks or requests.

• Problem solving: name the obstacle before choosing a route

  The National Library of Medicine's scope note describes problem solving as a learning situation in which a choice among alternatives is made to reach a particular goal.

• Processing speed: understand the term without timing someone at home

  The National Library of Medicine defines processing speed in terms of the time needed to understand and perform a mental task.

• Procrastination: describe the delay without inventing its cause

  Oregon State University's Academic Success Center describes procrastination as postponing work or doing a preferred activity instead of the project or task that needs doing.

• Project-based learning: ask what question organizes the project

  PBLWorks describes project-based learning as teaching organized around sustained investigation of a meaningful, complex question or problem, with students presenting their work to an audience.

• Proofreading: check the details of a nearly finished piece

  Proofreading is a check of the surface details in a nearly finished piece of writing, such as spelling, punctuation, and consistency.

• Prospective memory: remembering an action you intend to do later

  The National Library of Medicine's MeSH terminology links prospective memory with the capacity to carry out a future intention.

• Publication bias: which results made it into the visible record?

  The National Library of Medicine defines publication bias in terms of a study's results influencing its likelihood of publication, depending on their direction or strength.

• Qualitative research: understanding meaning and context

  In a report commissioned by NIH's Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, Creswell and colleagues describe qualitative research as systematic inquiry into people's experiences, meanings, and contexts, using approaches such as interviews, observations, and document review.

• Quantitative research: what was measured and counted?

  Creswell and colleagues' report for NIH OBSSR describes quantitative research as measuring variables to produce numerical data for statistical analysis, including description, examination of relationships, and testing hypotheses.

• Random sampling: who gets selected is a separate question

  The Australian Bureau of Statistics describes probability, or random, sampling as selection in which each unit's chance of being chosen can be determined; equal selection chances are a feature of simple random sampling, not every probability design.

• Randomized controlled trial: look for assignment by chance

  The National Library of Medicine describes a randomized controlled trial as comparing test and control treatments, assigned by chance, with the groups enrolled and followed during the same period.

• Reading comprehension: talk about the meaning being made from a text

  The International Literacy Association describes comprehension as making sense of material, including what a reader finds stated directly or implied.

• Reading fluency: ask which features of reading aloud are being discussed

  The International Literacy Association’s description of oral reading fluency includes accuracy, sufficient speed, and the stress, intonation, and expression of the reading.

• Recall: supplying remembered information

  Kihlstrom distinguishes recall tasks in which people supply remembered material, with either a general request or a more specific cue, from recognition tasks that present the target.

• Recognition memory: encountering remembered material again

  Kihlstrom's memory lectures describe recognition in terms of encountering the previously studied target itself, rather than having to produce it from a less specific prompt.

• Relative risk: find the two risks behind the comparison

  The National Cancer Institute describes relative risk as a comparison of the risk of the same event in two groups, also calling it a risk ratio.

• Reminder: agree on one prompt and its limits

  A reminder is a prompt about something a person intends or has agreed to do.

• Repair conversation: return to an ordinary disagreement without demanding closure

  We use repair conversation for an optional return to an ordinary disagreement: naming a specific action, hearing any correction the other person wants to offer, and discussing what could be different next time.

• Replication: checking a finding with another study

  The National Academies' 2019 report uses replicability for consistency across studies addressing the same question with separately collected data; it distinguishes this from computational reproducibility using the original data and analysis.

• Request: say what you are asking and leave room for an answer

  A request asks someone to do or provide something.

• Research protocol: reading the plan behind a study

  The National Cancer Institute uses protocol for a detailed account of how scientific or medical work is to be carried out.

• Research retraction: check the notice, the reason and the date

  The ICMJE recommends that a retraction notice clearly identify the affected article, link to it and explain the reason for retraction.

• Resilience: leave the difficult circumstances in the story

  The National Library of Medicine describes psychological resilience as a person's capacity to adapt amid adversity and serious continuing pressures.

• Response window: make the requested reply timing explicit

  A response window is the period in which someone is being asked to reply.

• Retrieval cue: the prompt in a remembering question

  In Kihlstrom's account of retrieval, a retrieval cue is information in a memory query or an encountered or self-generated prompt that points toward what is to be remembered.

• Retrieval practice: trying to bring material back to mind

  Cornell’s Learning Strategies Center describes retrieval practice as actively recalling information from memory and expressing it in a form such as writing or a diagram.

• Revision: reconsider what a draft says and how it is arranged

  Revision means making changes to an existing piece of work.

• Role expectations: name the assumption before calling it an agreement

  The APA Dictionary describes role expectations as qualities, attitudes, and actions considered appropriate to a position in a group or social setting.

• Routine: write a household sequence people can change

  A routine, in our everyday household use, is a sequence chosen for a recurring situation.

• Rubric

  A rubric, in the task-criteria sense used here, is a guide that describes what someone will look for in a piece of work and what different levels of meeting those criteria mean.

• Sample size: ask who or what the number counts

  In its clinical research dictionary, the National Cancer Institute uses sample size for the number of participants in the treatment groups.

• Scaffolding: support that can be adjusted

  The IRIS Center describes instructional scaffolding as temporary, adjustable supports that a teacher adds while students learn a task, with supports gradually removed as the task is mastered.

• School-home communication: bring one observation and a real question

  School-home communication is the exchange of relevant information and questions between a student's home and school.

• Search filter: name the criterion that narrows your results

  A search filter is a criterion used to narrow a set of results.

• Selection bias: ask who entered the evidence and who did not

  The U.S. National Library of Medicine describes selection bias as error arising from systematic differences between people selected for a study and those not selected.

• Selective attention: clarify which information is relevant to the task

  Université Laval's Interactive BRAIN resource describes selective attention as focusing on relevant information while disregarding information that is not relevant to the activity.

• Self-advocacy

  Self-advocacy, in this page's ordinary use, means expressing your own question, preference, or request and deciding how you want to take part in a conversation about it.

• Self-compassion: how you address yourself in difficulty

  The National Library of Medicine's self-compassion entry combines kindness toward oneself during difficulty, recognition that suffering belongs to human experience, and mindful attention to painful thoughts and feelings.

• Self-concept: what a description of yourself includes

  The APA Dictionary describes self-concept as one's description and evaluation of oneself, including characteristics, skills, qualities, and roles.

• Self-efficacy: confidence about a particular capability

  The APA Dictionary describes self-efficacy as a person's subjective view of their capability to perform in a particular setting or achieve an intended result.

• Self-esteem: personal value is not a task score

  A University of Connecticut educational resource distinguishes self-esteem, concerning how a student values herself, from self-efficacy, concerning confidence in particular skills.

• Self-monitoring: choose what you want to check about your own task

  Vanderbilt's IRIS Center uses self-monitoring in an educational context for students assessing their own behavior and recording what they observe.

• Self-regulation: a broader word than managing feelings

  The National Library of Medicine lists self-regulation under self-control, covering a person's monitoring and management of feelings, conduct, and wants in relation to outside demands.

• Sequencing: making the order of actions explicit

  Michigan Tech's human-computer interaction course describes a task sequence as the time order in which a task's actions are performed.

• Shame: discuss the word without assigning it

  The National Library of Medicine describes shame as an emotional response to recognizing a shortcoming or something considered improper.

• Shared calendar: keep one event's details and owners clear

  A shared calendar is a calendar more than one person uses to coordinate events.

• Shared document: agree what the working copy is for

  A shared document is a document people use together for a stated purpose.

• Shopping list: record the items people agreed to obtain

  A shopping list, in our coordination example, records items people have agreed to obtain on a particular trip or order.

• Short-term memory: brief retention and the working-memory boundary

  Cowan uses short-term memory for briefly keeping a limited amount of information readily accessible.

• Sibling rivalry: a term for competition, not every disagreement

  The APA Dictionary describes sibling rivalry as competition between siblings for parental attention, approval, or affection, or for other recognition and rewards.

• Social comparison: identify the person and the dimension being compared

  In its account of social comparison theory, the APA Dictionary describes evaluating one's abilities and attitudes relative to other people.

• Social model of disability: look at the arrangement, not only the individual

  In Fundamental Principles of Disability, UPIAS distinguishes physical impairment from restrictions produced by a social organization that excludes people with physical impairments.

• Source citation: leave a usable trail to the material you used

  MIT’s writing guide describes a citation as information that tells readers where material used in a document came from, so they can locate it.

• Spaced practice: the intervals between study occasions

  Cornell’s Learning Strategies Center uses spaced, or distributed, practice to mean studying or practicing material at separated intervals.

• Speech-to-text

  Speech-to-text means turning spoken words into written text.

• Statistical significance: not the same as importance

  The American Statistical Association states that statistical significance does not measure an effect's size or the importance of a result, and that scientific conclusions should not rest only on whether a p-value crosses a threshold.

• Stereotype: a group generalization is not knowledge of a person

  The APA Dictionary defines a stereotype as generalized beliefs or expectations about the characteristics of people in a group or social category.

• Stigma: when a label carries social devaluation

  The APA Dictionary describes stigma as a negative social attitude attached to a characteristic regarded as a deficiency, involving disapproval and potentially exclusion or discrimination.

• Strengths-based language: name capability without deleting difficulty

  UC Davis's Wraparound Connections describes strengths-based language as wording that is specific and balanced, attending to possibilities without avoiding the truth of a challenge.

• Stress: ask which meaning is being used

  The National Library of Medicine reserves its psychological-stress heading for stress in which emotional aspects are predominant.

• Study group: agree what learning together will involve

  A study group is a shared arrangement for people to work on learning material.

• Summary: keep the main points without changing the message

  A summary is a shorter account of the main points in a larger piece of material.

• Summative assessment: an end-point comparison

  Carnegie Mellon’s Eberly Center describes summative assessment as evaluating learning at the end of an instructional unit against a standard or benchmark.

• Support network: map the help people have actually agreed to offer

  A support network is a group of people or resources someone can turn to for help.

• Sustained attention: ask about the activity and the stretch of time

  Université Laval's Interactive BRAIN resource describes sustained attention as remaining focused during an activity requiring substantial concentration over an extended period.

• Syllabus: use the course map without confusing it with today's task

  A syllabus is a course-level outline or information document.

• Systematic review: look for the question and selection rules

  Cochrane's handbook describes a systematic review as an effort to gather evidence answering a specified question, using predetermined eligibility rules and explicit methods intended to reduce bias.

• Task batching

  Task batching means choosing several tasks to do in one session because they share something useful: materials, a location, a person, or a kind of action.

• Task breakdown: turn one large job into visible pieces

  A task breakdown is a description of the smaller pieces inside a larger job.

• Task initiation: agree what beginning one task would mean

  Stanford's Center for Teaching and Learning uses task initiation for the ability to begin a task without delay or hesitation.

• Task ownership: name the preparation, doing, and follow-up

  Task ownership is an explicit agreement about who is responsible for a particular piece of work.

• Task resumption: returning to the interrupted activity

  In Draxler and colleagues' mobile-learning paper, task resumption means returning to the activity that an interruption suspended.

• Task switching: name the next task and the return point

  Jost and colleagues use task switching for changing from one task to another within a sequence of tasks.

• Temperament: describe a tendency without fixing a role

  The National Library of Medicine describes temperament as a tendency to respond to one's surroundings in a particular way, commonly referring to changes in mood.

• Text-to-speech

  Text-to-speech means turning written text into spoken audio.

• Time blocking: reserve a window without promising completion

  Time blocking means reserving a period on a schedule for a chosen activity.

• Time estimation: separate a task guess from a deadline

  In Stanford's college project-planning guidance, estimating task length means judging how long a listed task may take.

• Time perception: describing a judgment of elapsed time

  The National Library of Medicine's MeSH vocabulary describes time perception as judging how much time has passed or how long an interval lasts.

• Timer: agree what happens when it ends

  A timer marks an interval of time.

• Turn-taking

  Turn-taking is an agreed sequence for speaking, choosing, or doing part of an activity.

• Universal design for learning: a named design framework

  CAST’s UDL On Campus site describes universal design for learning, or UDL, as a framework for designing learning goals, materials, methods, assessments, and related policies with learner diversity in mind.

• Validation

  In an ordinary conversation, validation can mean acknowledging the experience, concern, or preference another person has described.

• Version history: inspect earlier states without assuming a complete record

  Google's Docs Editors Help describes viewing earlier file versions and their changes; it also says that viewing version history requires edit permission and that revisions may be merged.

• Visual schedule: show the sequence without hiding the choices

  A visual schedule is a display of activities in an intended order.

• What is ADHD? A simple explanation for families

  Read a source-attributed ADHD definition, then use a shared-moment example to make room for the person, parent, sibling, partner, grandparent, and educator.

• Worked example: a solution with its steps visible

  MIT Open Learning uses worked examples to mean solved problems presented with the steps leading to their solutions.

• Working memory: information you are using right now

  Harvard's activities guide describes working memory as keeping information mentally available while using it.

• Workspace setup

  Workspace setup means arranging a place and the materials for a chosen task.

• Worry: put an uncertain concern into your own words

  A University of Georgia Cooperative Extension article describes worry as repeatedly considering something that, at that moment, a person cannot act on.