POSTED Aug 4

Children’s Storyteller and Script Writer at Mystery Science

  • Content Copy Writing
  • Fulltime
  • Anywhere (100% Remote) Only
Job Description

Children’s Storyteller & Script Writer

at Mystery.org

Remote US-Based OR San Francisco, CA

The Role

We’re looking for a Children’s Storyteller / Script Writer with a can-do attitude and a passion for helping children explore and understand our fascinating world. We’ve been working hard for a few years to create one of the easiest to use and most popular science curricula in the country. One component of our product is a weekly 5-minute video series that answers questions children ask. We’ve collected about a million questions so far and we plan to answer all of them. Between our science curriculum and our weekly mini-lessons, nearly 4 million children experience our explanations each month! Being a Children’s Storyteller / Script Writer at Mystery.org means you’ll be joining our content development team in producing more amazing lessons and videos that reach many more millions of students worldwide.

As the Script Writer, you’ll be in charge of writing scripts for either our weekly 5-minute videos or the 10-20 minute videos in our K-5 science curriculum. Mystery has an established voice and a content strategy that we’ve honed – we don’t tell children what to think; we guide them to explore and be curious – and as the Script Writer, you’ll work closely with the other key contributors (especially the visual storytellers and the activity developers) and collaborate with Mystery’s co-founder and first narrator/scriptwriter, Doug Peltz, to create explanations that get children excited about the world we live in and foster a curiosity that will propel them to become the problem solvers of the future.

This position reports to Soo Kim, our Director of Content. We are headquartered in San Francisco and this full-time salaried position can be based either in our office or remote in the US.

About You

You understand how to engage elementary-aged children through stories, and you love to figure out what makes them tick. What are children most curious about? When they ask a question, what is it they really want to know? You’re someone who “gets” children and can also help others understand them better.

  • Do you love to write and craft stories? You have a minimum of 3 years of experience writing in a professional setting. Maybe you’ve written short stories or a children’s book, authored articles for magazines, or crafted story beats for an episodic TV series. You’re interested in what makes for a great story.
  • Do you love to learn about the wonders of the world around us? You’ll love this role and will excel at it if you get excited and energized when you get to figure something out! You’re endlessly fascinated by the world around you and have a scienc-y bend to your interests– maybe you studied science in college or worked as a park ranger, or maybe you are a Renaissance person who reads broadly in history or popular science. You love the journey of discovery!
  • Do you enjoy working with or being around elementary-aged children? Maybe you’ve worked as a generalist elementary teacher or science specialist, or a content creator at a museum or even a YouTube creator that has built a successful children’s audience. At the core, you think kids are amazing and you think deeply about what makes them tick.
  • Do you embrace the give-and-take of a collaborative creative process? You love the growth that comes from working with other experts, such as visual storytellers or curriculum designers, to create the best content possible. You’re equally excited about immersing yourself in the creative flow for large blocks of time and about running a structured process that enables the best minds to weigh in on the work. You are ready to put yourself out there, make mistakes, and delight in learning and getting feedback. You don’t worry about getting it right the first time, but enjoy getting better over time.

Day-to-day

As the Children’s Storyteller / Script Writer, your main focus will be:

  • Writing scripts for our weekly mini-lessons. You’ll develop scripts for our weekly mini-lessons (5-min video series), leaning into our unique, engaging approach. This involves everything from figuring out the specific questions to answer, to identifying the angle we want to take, researching the topic, and writing the production-ready script which will be narrated for the episode.
  • Writing scripts for our K-5 science lessons. As we expand and revise our K-5 curriculum, you’ll write video scripts for full-length lessons, contribute to step-by-step activity descriptions, and write very short-form content, such as captions for our Top 5 bonus activities.

In this role, you’ll work closely with our visual storytellers, activity designers, and K-5 elementary science experts. In any given week, you may join in a brainstorming session on seasonal activities, suggest improvements to activity instructions, or act as a thought partner for a team member who is exploring a new type of lesson. You’ll see the impact of your work immediately and you’ll have the chance to collaborate with amazing individuals who regularly reflect on their processes to see if we can deliver even better content and materials to children, teachers, and other adults in children’s lives.

About Mystery.org

At Mystery.org, we believe it’s important that children stay curious as they grow up. We will ensure that the next generation sees it’s an amazing world we live in, full of possibility and wonder and that they learn how to figure things out for themselves.

We’ve created Mystery Science, the most widely used elementary science resource in the country. We have teachers signed up from 89% of elementary schools in the U.S. and now 50% of schools use us every month. We’ve created one of the fastest-growing learning resources and a brand that is loved by children and grown-ups alike.

We want children to have the ability to explore anything they are curious about. There are 1 billion children in the world today, and we want to make it possible for them to explore their questions, wherever they are. Over the past decade, the internet has given grownups a new superpowerthe ability to instantly explore anything they wonder about–but children have been left behind. So we’re collecting every question children ask and creating video explanations and resources for teachers to answer questions that children care about . We think this will be the most important learning tool ever created.

Meet The Team

On your first day at Mystery.org, you’ll meet a group of 50 people who are passionate about learning and who each love their respective crafts. We were founded by Keith Schacht and Doug Peltz, who started Mystery Science in 2014. They have assembled a team of the best explainers in the world from the Exploratorium, Klutz, Stanford, the Field Museum, and leading private schools. In addition to the core Mystery.org team, we also collaborate with the passionate, expert team at Discovery Education, our parent company.

We have a strong focus on people which extends to every area of the company. We’re building the team that we want to work with.

Mystery.org is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to being an employer of choice, not just a good place to work, but a great and inclusive place to work. To that end, we strive to recruit and maintain a workforce that meaningfully represents the diverse and culturally rich communities that we serve. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to their race, color, religion, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, protected veteran status or disabled status or, genetic information.

Inspired?

If you are inspired by our mission and passionate about helping teachers succeed and transforming science education for kids, we’d like to hear from you! 

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Mystery Science

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