This paper describes an attempt to elicit new science terms in general language which are suitable for inclusion in a general dictionary of Norwegian, by comparing lemma lists from two small corpora of teaching materials for 16–17-year olds. One corpus dates from the 1940s, the other from 1990–2000. A selection of likely science terms was extracted independently from each lemma list. Lemma lists are checked against general dictionaries, grouped by occurrence and discussed according to type