Growing Pains

Here's what I know. Science learning fosters constant growth. In the last literature circle the question was posed "why do people find it difficult to ask questions?", and my gut-reaction was BECAUSE IT MAKES PEOPLE UNCOMFORTABLE. I stand by that reaction, because its true. Asking questions, digging for a better answer, for more extensive research defines the scientific community. To be someone who is able to ask those questions, means you have to be someone who is OK with being vulnerable, opening up, to work towards a more defined answer, towards greater collaboration. Both teachers and students in the science classroom need to be acutely aware of this fact to succeed.

Constant growth... I have been weirdly drawn to the story of Gary, Indiana for many years now. Gary, Indiana was a city formed artificially by the U.S. Steel Corporation in 1906 in a response to the high demand for steel production. Nestled on the shore of Lake Michigan, 25 miles south of Chicago Gary was a booming steel town on the forefront of science and industry. In fact, its education system was under the microscope from the start, because all of this science and industry made way for a "progressive" way of educating called scientific management. In a nutshell, "the factory model" of schooling in Gary was modeled after the factories that produced the steel for automobiles. At its inception administrators loved it, because it provided a away to send students on appropriate paths based on their achievements (think sorting hat) and while some students who thrived in the regimented environment loved it because they succeeded, many other students felt dismissed and unimportant. This model of education changed the U.S.'s school system for the greater part of the 20th century. Which is a real shame, because I'm not convinced that very much true learning took place there.

These schools were the antithesis of growth presented as the most efficient way to get the job done. Gary's economy collapsed in the early 1960s due to the outsourcing of steel production. Just like that, it decayed into a ghost town now overgrown with nature.

I think science education can be so much more than a list of rules and steps to churn out a product. Ready to let the science take over?

Here's some photos I took of a school in Gary, Indiana this summer:

It's always in the last place you look...

Science is in the most unexpected places. This fall I took a trip to the most magical place on earth. Literally. I went to Disney World. I know, I know. What does a trip to Disney have to do with science? Well, guys, Disney is oozing with science! Aside from the fact that Walt Disney may or may not be cryogenically frozen waiting for the perfect moment to be re-animated, that guy had science on the brain all of the time. I cannot think of a man-made place that I have been that creates an environment of scientific exploration better than Disney. I mean, there's the science of advertising, of human behaviors, perfectly timed explosions, strategically placed turkey legs... But where else can you travel to outer space, explore a dilapidated mine or view the totems of Indoneisna all within a matter of hours? What does all of this take? Imagination! I could be grooming the brains of future Disney imagineers in a matter of years... So, how am I going to keep science imaginative and fun? I'm going to try my best to think like that kook Walt Disney and bring ideas to life, by engaging and imagining right along with my little people. So, that one day they can click on this link to help imagine the new frontier, new frontiers that I can't even fathom yet: https://jobs.disneycareers.com/job/burbank/management-science-integration-internship-burbank-ca-spring-2016/391/596723

I liked the juxtaposition of this snapshot I took, like here's a rare bird in gorgeous flowers, here's Space Mountain...

"non-nutritive, non-digestible, water-insoluble"

Let's talk bubblegum, folks. For some reason, when I read the definition of what makes bubblegum stretchy I imagine Clark Griswold in the classic film "Vegas Vacation" explaining that those hideous milk bags that Rusty and Audrey are drinking are eight years old because of the non-nutritive food preservative that he invented, but I digress. There was a lot of hype about this experiment over the course of the semester, and now I understand why. This was an excellent way to incorporate all of this STUFF we've been poring over all semester and bring it into the classroom in a way that we could experience the process of a science experiment the way that our future students will. I mean, how cool is it to work through what seems to be a simple question with your peers and then immediately devise a plan to answer that query. THAT is science learning in action. THAT is fun. And, as an aside, I haven't desired a piece of chewing gum since, because whoa, that stuff is sweet! Like, yucky sweet. It was enlightening to do an entire experiment, start to finish in an hour, too. You really feel the magnitude of how much you need to use your brain to change gears and test your ideas. It's exhausting! Here's a cool website that features some teachers just like us! http://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/ScienceBuddiesinAction.shtml

And here's our AWESOME chart from our experiment! Our team wanted to confirm or deny if sugary bubblegum stretched farther than sugar-free gum. It did!

Lunar Lunacy

OK. I cannot emphasize how much I learned from the lunar lander model experiment. We want our kiddos to do things that have the potential to frustrate them a lot every. single. day. My life to this point has taught me, if nothing else, that you learn a whole lotta ways to do things the wrong way before you can even begin to be open enough to learn how to do them the "right" way. That experiment pissed me off. I can blame it on the fuzziness of the yarn or the angle at which we adjusted the cup, but we just flat out just didn't figure it out and that's what I needed to learn at that moment. NASA scientists don't always get it, my students won't always get it and I won't always get it. But you want to know what I did do? I thought about how to make that marble hit the target all night. What better homework can we be assigning than that?

Math + Science Night

So, I ended up going with one of my initial ideas for my Math + Science night presentation. Static Electricity! Why? Because it's weird and interesting, and if I think something is weird and interesting then kids probably will think so too. I had so much fun! There is a common phrase in the artistic community that says, "Creativity is just knowing who to steal from". Upon first glance that seems like a pretty negative thought, but it's bigger than that and it applies to the scientific community too. So, I tore a page out of Cliff's book and dressed as Ion the Positive Electrician to explain why static electricity does what it does. I borrowed from my theatre days for this one, because any excuse to wear a wig feels like a good excuse to me. Here's something to ponder: Everything in the UNIVERSE exerts a gravitational force on everything else. Whoa. That means that when you rub a wool sock on a balloon and hover that balloon over salt and pepper, the pepper sticks! That also means that the balance of positive and negative energy in your classroom defines your community. I believe that as teachers we govern our classrooms and we are attracted to this profession because we are strong forces. We can use those forces for good or bad, healing or hurting active or passive teaching. I also believe that using a balloon to talk about electricity is really fun. What do you believe?

Here's the super cool experiment I did for my project, it's got a great worksheet to help your kiddos with the experiment! https://www.we-energies.com/educators/classroom/static_elec_lesson.pdf

Blue Flame University

Um, guys, it's really exciting to engage with someone who is passionate about what they do! I am stoked to be a graduate of Blue Flame University. Plus, I actually know what number to call before I dig! 8-1-1' y'all! But why? Why do I know what number to call? I know because Cliff Swoape hammered essential information into my brain by explaining something that SEEMS boring to the unengaged observer and then by inviting me into the learning process. As a teacher, how do I do that? That's a loaded question, but as Cliff showed, it starts when I get excited about what I want my kiddos to know. I still have a visual imagining of the map that has the natural gas pipelines on it, and I realized that I have prior knowledge about those pipelines because my uncle works on them in Colorado. See what I just did there? I did what I want my students to do, to see something that sparks a memory or fact in their knowledge bank and build on those facts and ideas to facilitate learning. THAT is engaging their minds in order to build on something they know to be true, so that they learn in a way that is meaningful to them. I found this cool website to dig into that explains ways to discuss natural gas in the classroom: http://www.eia.gov/kids/energy.cfm?page=natural_gas_home-basics

And... Here's my uncle doing his thing!

I'm obsessing about how much water it takes to make cheese.

Wow. I certainly did not go into Tuesday night's learning experience at Bonnie's house with any expectation about it impacting the rest of my week so intensely. I keep picturing those blue cylinders of water, specifically the blue cylinder which illustrated the amount of water on earth for human and animal consumption. Crazy, y'all! It's funny, the exercise where we traced our foot resonated the least with me while we were working, but I've been obsessing over my "water footprint" since we left Tuesday night!

I'm already considering the ways in which I will be able to incorporate the information from our new textbook into my own classroom. Honestly, I think there are so many ways these concepts can bleed past my Science teachings into English, Math and Art. I love the idea of teaching these invaluable Human-centered concepts in a blended way so that my kids don't even realize the scope of their learning #sneakyteaching . There is nothing more important to me as an educator than helping children to become conscientious of their actions and how those actions affect everyone and everything they touch. It makes me think of a portion of one of favorite quotes, "... as no cause remains without its due effect from greatest to least, from a cosmic disturbance down to the motion of your hand, like produces like..." 

Seriously though, I can't give up cheese. 

It's Electric!

I am having a hair-raising time trying to whittle down all of the ideas that are bouncing around in my head for my science fair topic. I mean, what did I think was a cool in elementary school? For a few days I was dead set on doing a project on organic versus non-organic bananas and their rate of decay, but then I realized that 8 year olds are most likely not that interested in brown bananas or whether or not they cost .30 more a pound. Then it struck me, I actually already wrote about an excellent science fair topic in my first blog post, the old rub-a-balloon-on-your-head-so-you-look-like-the-bride-of-frankenstein-trick. Static electricity is SO COOL, and with a little help from the googles I've explored so many different spoooooky ways you can explain how electricity of the static nature works, like making a mini ghost or mummy dance with the help of a balloon. I'm super excited to work on my project in reverse and teach a lesson in the mean time, which is a first for me in the world of science experimentation. I've never gotten to impart how neat I think science is on little people, and I'm excited to use the same methodology I will teach upon and expect from my future students to arrive at what I already know to be true.

Making Connections: The Graduate Experience

Hey Folks!

I'm sitting at my dining room table with stacks of books and papers around me dwelling on assignments that seem to be multiplying like gremlins. This is what graduate school is supposed to be like, right? In any life transition it takes time to acclimate, and there's usually a turning point in that acclimation period where you remember why you started the crazy ride you hopped on. I seem to be coming around that bend, and as fate may have it, this realization happened while I was simultaneously doing work for Teaching Science and my Assessment class. I FINALLY CONNECTED CONCEPTS FROM TWO CLASSES WHICH MADE SENSE TOGETHER... This week's science reading was focused on Foundational Knowledge and Conceptual Change, and I was assigned a unit on Formative Assessment to teach my other class. Guess what, guys? They're about the same teaching style! ::woo hoo! bells! whistles! happy dance!:: And its a teaching style that really excites me.

If we, as teachers, are setting out to really structure little brains then we must teach those brains accountability, responsibility and useful concepts. The reading booklet for my assessment class offered some really helpful teaching tactics. Like, allowing students to utilize red, yellow and green cards in an effort to communicate their current understanding of a lecture-style lesson, which allows a teacher to adjust their teaching angle in the moment. The information that struck me the most in the two readings however was that deciding upon a few useful curricular targets and defining a few, definite learning pillars to reach that curricular target is infinitely more effective than setting many different small goals and knocking those out in a more traditional teach - study- test scenario. While, both readings do emphasize that this teaching style takes a lot more preparation and active participation they both clearly note that these foundational assessment tactics actually set up students for le real world!

Here's a picture of my planner!

Science is Everywhere: The Nature of Science

It's very interesting that after so many years outside of a science classroom, a few visits back to one can remind us of a passion that seemed long forgotten...

In our first class meeting Dr. Kat told us that, as a scientist herself, she collects data about humans before she comes to conclusions about them. She also requested that as a class we molest a piece of bread. In this class, I came to the conclusion that Dr. Kat is not only a scientist; she is a funny scientist. And really, science IS funny. It's a series of trial and error, of drunken old men tying keys to kites and of six year olds at birthday parties rubbing balloons on their heads. Science is a community of people not only asking WHY, but taking the next step to figure out WHY, which is invaluable to our future students. If you can teach a child to not only recognize a problem but attempt to solve it, you've given that child a real tool that they need to survive and more importantly, to succeed.

Let's talk shop. I really love the hands on time with science experiments. Our second class experiment had us elbow deep in Dino bones and differing opinions. As an owner of the original VHS of Jurassic Park, I was clearly a force to be reckoned with... Or not, because I legitimately thought we had an alligator with a six foot long neck on our hands. This personal belief led to a very interesting collaborative experience with my fellow science mates, because Christina was certain she had met this Dino before, April's fierce intuition was certain he could fly and Jeremy II was just as in the dark as I was, meaning, we were sure that some of the bones formed legs which probably were attached to the torso. With each new cue from Dr. Kat we had to observe our new discoveries, infer what they meant to us and creatively decide how they fit into our puzzle. That's some powerful stuff, y'all! After a visit to the other team's laboratory, we learned a bit more about the pelvic bone, but our results were still inconclusive. As I mentioned before, April knew our little buddy was of the avian variety. So, when we presented our hypothesis to our adjacent team at the science conference we told them that he was ready for lift off, and wouldn't you know, HE REALLY DID FLY. Vini Vidi Vici.

Here is a drawing of a happy spider with 7 legs:

Hear ye! Hear ye! Is this thing on?

Hey Everyone

Welcome to my brain! This is my first foray into the world of blogging thanks to Dr. Kat, and if it proves to be as fun as choosing my background photo was, I'm in for a treat. I feel scientifically whimsical and nostalgic as I ponder my MySpace HTML days.

oh, Hey Tom...