So here is the link, in case you and/or your children would also like to see how they fare on a "typical" 8th grade science quiz.
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label science. Show all posts
Monday, May 20, 2013
8th Grade Science Quiz
In North Carolina, homeschoolers have to take nationally-normed standardized tests once a year. We usually do ours in May, so we are brushing up on some of the topics right now. In looking for some resources, I found a quiz of science topics commonly covered in 8th grade (which my son is completing). I like these kinds of things just to help me make sure I haven't TOTALLY missed some topic that is appropriate for his age.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Curriculum Resource: Online Lessons for Middle School Literacy
When it as hot as it has been in the Southeast lately, reading is a great activity. If you want to add some educational lessons to your middle schooler's summer reading, the Boston public television station, WGBH, has some useful online lessons to teach literacy schools. Entitled Inspiring Middle School Literacy, and funded by Walmart, these self-paced digital lessons combine video, interactive exercises, and writing to hone such skills as constructing summaries, distinguishing fact from opinion, categorization, comparing and contrasting items, etc. They are designed for students in grades 5-8, and are also arranged by content areas: English Language Arts, Science and Health Topics, and Social Studies Topics.
Check them out on the WGBH website.
Check them out on the WGBH website.
Friday, July 6, 2012
Curriculum Resource: Educational Video on Higgs Boson Particle
One of my favorite science educators, Science Jim, has just posted a new video explaining the Higgs Boson particle. Watch his 7 minute summary of this new scientific discovery below:
For more humorous but enlightening videos on other science concepts, be sure to check out the Science Jim Show page on his website for other free resources. He also has a series of very reasonably priced web classes that you can get on his website or through CurrClick, as well as live, hands-on science classes in the Triangle NC area.
For more humorous but enlightening videos on other science concepts, be sure to check out the Science Jim Show page on his website for other free resources. He also has a series of very reasonably priced web classes that you can get on his website or through CurrClick, as well as live, hands-on science classes in the Triangle NC area.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Turning Coral Conservation into Child's Play
I haven't posted in over a week, which I think is the longest I've ever gone since I've started this blog without posting. I wish I could say it was due to Screen Free Week and my virtuous decision to eschew all things electronic, but it wasn't. It is because I've been so busy with the Cards, Coral & Kids campaign for my son's environmental awareness group, Healing Oceans Together (H2O).
The idea behind this project, which is to create a Pokemon-like card game that would teach people about coral reef life and ecosystems and actions they can take to help the corals survive, is explained here and here, so I won't go into that again in my blog. What I wanted to talk about here is some of the thinking behind the project.
You know, young teens are interesting creatures. They are old enough to realize some of the problems with the world, and most are hopeful and confident about being part of the solution. They tend to be really into Earth Day and recycling, Save the Planet, Stop Global Warming, Protect the Rain Forests, and the like.
And yet, on a daily basis, we are still telling them "Shut the Refridgerator Door!" "Turn Off the Lights when You Leave the Room!" "Don't Leave the Computer Running All Night!" or the frustrated but perhaps dangerous question of "Why Does it Take You 30 Minutes of Running Water to Take a Shower?"
Maybe it's different at your house. But for many of us, our children's grand rhetoric for saving the planet doesn't match up with their everyday life habits. Of course, that's really true for most of us adults as well...
In H2O, the students have been studying ocean science and math since September. We decided to hone in on coral conservation because coral reefs are really the marine equivalent of rain forests. Although coral reefs only make up about 0.1% of the oceans, they are home to approximately 25% of all marine life! Also, corals take a long time to grow, so our damage to reefs that may be hundreds or thousands of years old can not be replaced within many of our human generations.
But what to do that would make a difference? There are already tons of books and videos and ads and educational resources on this issue, but people continue doing what they've always done. As parents, we've trying nagging, threatening, bribing, begging, and everything short of bloodshed, and yet...we, too, are largely ineffectual. So we needed to come up with something else, something new.
And then we had a brainstorm. Instead of using guilt and threats and dire warnings of environmental catastrophes, what if we made saving the coral reefs fun? What if we made it....into a game?
In approaching it this way, we were influenced by the work of Jane McGonigal, whose work is summarized in a video I included in an earlier post. Her video on that page, a TED talk on how "Gaming Can Make a Better World," is a synopsis of her wonderful book, Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World. In short, she argues that time people spend on video games actually helps them develop positive characteristics (such as working hard, cooperation, and optomism), and explores how to structure games so that we can channel all the time people spend playing games into social activism games that will help solve Earth's real-world problems. It is a fascinating and inspiring book, and I recommend it highly.
So, in short, that is what we are trying to do with this game. First, the game will teach students (and adults as well) the real science behind food chains and interlocking ecosystems in the coral reefs. We think this is important because we think if people knew more about all these fascinating creatures, they would love them, and we take care of the things we love (for more of our philosophy on that, read the Family Educators Commons article that Maria Droujkova and I co-wrote on the Shareable website). But secondly, we will build into the games a way for them to earn (or lose) points based on their actions in real life. You insist that I drive you to the library? You lose 5 points. You walk or ride your bike there yourself? You gain 5 points. You stand there with the refridgerator open as you drink your water/milk/juice? You lose 3 points. You close the door and drink it at the table? Well, I don't know that we'll give you points for that, since that should be normal behavior, but at least you won't lose points. You keep your showers under 10 minutes? You get 2 points. You keep your showers under 5 minutes? You get 5 points.
You get the idea.
Anyway, we think this game has the potential to give kids incentives for to change those behaviors that we parents have been nagging them about for years, but to no avail. If we all make those small changes, maybe they won't completely solve the problem, but they will make things better. And making things better is something that can make us all feel good.
If you would like to be a part of helping to make this game happen, then please visit our Cards, Coral & Kids campaign. For a small donation, you could get a deck of the cards before they are released to the public, participate in our pilot trials and research project, or even give input into the cards themselves! Also, please spread the word about this idea to all your social media networks, email loops, and friends and family. Getting the funding we need to develop the game requires reaching lots of people, so anything you can do to help is greatly appreciated!
The idea behind this project, which is to create a Pokemon-like card game that would teach people about coral reef life and ecosystems and actions they can take to help the corals survive, is explained here and here, so I won't go into that again in my blog. What I wanted to talk about here is some of the thinking behind the project.
You know, young teens are interesting creatures. They are old enough to realize some of the problems with the world, and most are hopeful and confident about being part of the solution. They tend to be really into Earth Day and recycling, Save the Planet, Stop Global Warming, Protect the Rain Forests, and the like.
And yet, on a daily basis, we are still telling them "Shut the Refridgerator Door!" "Turn Off the Lights when You Leave the Room!" "Don't Leave the Computer Running All Night!" or the frustrated but perhaps dangerous question of "Why Does it Take You 30 Minutes of Running Water to Take a Shower?"
Maybe it's different at your house. But for many of us, our children's grand rhetoric for saving the planet doesn't match up with their everyday life habits. Of course, that's really true for most of us adults as well...
In H2O, the students have been studying ocean science and math since September. We decided to hone in on coral conservation because coral reefs are really the marine equivalent of rain forests. Although coral reefs only make up about 0.1% of the oceans, they are home to approximately 25% of all marine life! Also, corals take a long time to grow, so our damage to reefs that may be hundreds or thousands of years old can not be replaced within many of our human generations.
But what to do that would make a difference? There are already tons of books and videos and ads and educational resources on this issue, but people continue doing what they've always done. As parents, we've trying nagging, threatening, bribing, begging, and everything short of bloodshed, and yet...we, too, are largely ineffectual. So we needed to come up with something else, something new.
And then we had a brainstorm. Instead of using guilt and threats and dire warnings of environmental catastrophes, what if we made saving the coral reefs fun? What if we made it....into a game?
In approaching it this way, we were influenced by the work of Jane McGonigal, whose work is summarized in a video I included in an earlier post. Her video on that page, a TED talk on how "Gaming Can Make a Better World," is a synopsis of her wonderful book, Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World. In short, she argues that time people spend on video games actually helps them develop positive characteristics (such as working hard, cooperation, and optomism), and explores how to structure games so that we can channel all the time people spend playing games into social activism games that will help solve Earth's real-world problems. It is a fascinating and inspiring book, and I recommend it highly.
So, in short, that is what we are trying to do with this game. First, the game will teach students (and adults as well) the real science behind food chains and interlocking ecosystems in the coral reefs. We think this is important because we think if people knew more about all these fascinating creatures, they would love them, and we take care of the things we love (for more of our philosophy on that, read the Family Educators Commons article that Maria Droujkova and I co-wrote on the Shareable website). But secondly, we will build into the games a way for them to earn (or lose) points based on their actions in real life. You insist that I drive you to the library? You lose 5 points. You walk or ride your bike there yourself? You gain 5 points. You stand there with the refridgerator open as you drink your water/milk/juice? You lose 3 points. You close the door and drink it at the table? Well, I don't know that we'll give you points for that, since that should be normal behavior, but at least you won't lose points. You keep your showers under 10 minutes? You get 2 points. You keep your showers under 5 minutes? You get 5 points.
You get the idea.
Anyway, we think this game has the potential to give kids incentives for to change those behaviors that we parents have been nagging them about for years, but to no avail. If we all make those small changes, maybe they won't completely solve the problem, but they will make things better. And making things better is something that can make us all feel good.
If you would like to be a part of helping to make this game happen, then please visit our Cards, Coral & Kids campaign. For a small donation, you could get a deck of the cards before they are released to the public, participate in our pilot trials and research project, or even give input into the cards themselves! Also, please spread the word about this idea to all your social media networks, email loops, and friends and family. Getting the funding we need to develop the game requires reaching lots of people, so anything you can do to help is greatly appreciated!
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Craft Coral Reef
I haven't been blogging as much recently because I've been so involved with the Healing Oceans Together (H2O) environmental education and awareness group that my son is helping to organize. (Regular readers of this blog may remember the Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest that H2O ran earlier this year.)
Now the group has moved on from raising awareness about sea slugs to encouraging people to help save the rapidly-disappearing coral reefs. The first step in the process is that H2O is creating a community-based Craft Coral Reef to exhibit at ChambersArts, an art gallery in downtown Cary. This artistic version of a coral reef, which will incorporate crochet and knitting, origami, beading, and other crafts, is supposed to remind people of the precious beauty of the coral reefs, educate them about the important role they play in our ocean ecology, and inspire them to take actions to help protect and preserve them.
We've been holding a series of FREE public workshops to get other people crocheting and crafting along with our group and contributing to the growing reef. So far we've held three public workshops, and the results have been great.
Before launching the project, H2O crocheted some sample creations to show people:
You can follow that blog if you are really interested. I'll also post some more photo updates to show you how our community Coral Reef grows.
Finally, next week we are launching another exciting initiative related to our "Save the Corals" campaign. So stay tuned for that announcement!
Now the group has moved on from raising awareness about sea slugs to encouraging people to help save the rapidly-disappearing coral reefs. The first step in the process is that H2O is creating a community-based Craft Coral Reef to exhibit at ChambersArts, an art gallery in downtown Cary. This artistic version of a coral reef, which will incorporate crochet and knitting, origami, beading, and other crafts, is supposed to remind people of the precious beauty of the coral reefs, educate them about the important role they play in our ocean ecology, and inspire them to take actions to help protect and preserve them.
We've been holding a series of FREE public workshops to get other people crocheting and crafting along with our group and contributing to the growing reef. So far we've held three public workshops, and the results have been great.
Before launching the project, H2O crocheted some sample creations to show people:
But a few weeks later, after the second public workshop, the Craft Coral Reef had grown to this:
Beautiful--and exciting to see the progress!
For more information on this project, including some photos from the workshops we've held, check out the complete write-up on the Healing Oceans Together blog.
You can follow that blog if you are really interested. I'll also post some more photo updates to show you how our community Coral Reef grows.
Finally, next week we are launching another exciting initiative related to our "Save the Corals" campaign. So stay tuned for that announcement!
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Curriculum Resource: How We Use Energy
About 60 years ago, the average American produced about 4 metric tons of carbon dioxide due to the energy s/he used. Today, the average is almost 5 times that--19 metric tons per person. So what changed?
PBS Learning has produced a nice little interactive illustration of the ways that energy usage has changed between now and then. Check out Changing the Balance.
PBS Learning has produced a nice little interactive illustration of the ways that energy usage has changed between now and then. Check out Changing the Balance.
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Spring and Gratitude
Today is Easter in North Carolina, so Happy Easter for those who celebrate this day! Of course, the Jewish holiday of Passover has just occurred, so a belated Happy Passover to those readers. And it wasn't too long ago that the Pagan holiday of Ostara took place, so good thoughts towards any of you who might be Wiccan or other variations of Paganism. And there are probably some Spring celebrations in Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism that I just don't know about; if so, happy thoughts in your direction as well.
I'm sure that it is no coincidence that so many of these religious celebrations take place in Spring. You don't have to follow any religious practice at all to be uplifted and inspired by the rebirth that takes place in Nature at this time of the year. I'm noting that even though our past winter was so mild that it seems like turning into Spring wouldn't be that big of a deal, but the flowers and such seem even more intense this year, as if knowing they had to put on an extra special show in order to show off the contrast between the seasons in a year of temperate temperatures.
There are two non-religious Spring-related occasions that we particularly celebrate in our household, or at least we have for the past few years. One is the opening of our local Farmers' Market in Cary. While we do have access to fresh vegetables all year round at other Farmers' Markets in the area, the Cary market is shut down from December through March. So by the time the first Saturday in April rolls around, I can't wait to see all my farmer friends and start buying fresh, local produce again directly from the producers. And this year was extra special because, after a hiatus of a couple of years, the Cary Farmers' Market has once again move to downtown Cary, and is in even closer walking distance from my house than it was previously! That means a lot to me in my ongoing efforts to reduce our family's carbon footprint.
Another event of great note in our home is the first fresh local strawberries of the year. Every since reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma (yes, that book AGAIN, for my regular readers....what can I say, it changed my life), I no longer buy fresh strawberries except locally during our relatively short growing season in North Carolina (read the book to find out why). But I seriously love strawberries, so it is a big deal when they return to our diet, albiet for only a few, short, precious weeks. So only buying local strawberries in season has really raised my appreciation for this wonderful fruit that is gone all too soon.
But this year, for the first time since I've been shopping at the Farmers' Market, Market Opening Day and First Strawberry Day coincided! Apparently the mild winter has coaxed the local strawberries into blooming early. So, joy of joy, I bought a mess of them, and they will be part of our Easter celebration at our spiritual center (we are having an egg hunt for the children, but the eggs will contain fruit instead of candy) and our Easter dinner table. But I have already welcomed the strawberries by opening a bottle of champagne with a friend and drinking the sparkling wine with our first strawberries in the glass as well.
So pick what inspires you--your religious or spiritual tradition, Nature's beauty, the longer days, the warmer weather, or the return of the seasonal crops. Spring is great time to be thankful for all the wonderful things that this planet continues to provide us, despite our often not-too-great stewardship of its resources.
I'll end with a lovely video on Nature and gratitude that my friend Lorna shared with me. I hope you find it as inspiring as I did.
Enjoy!
I'm sure that it is no coincidence that so many of these religious celebrations take place in Spring. You don't have to follow any religious practice at all to be uplifted and inspired by the rebirth that takes place in Nature at this time of the year. I'm noting that even though our past winter was so mild that it seems like turning into Spring wouldn't be that big of a deal, but the flowers and such seem even more intense this year, as if knowing they had to put on an extra special show in order to show off the contrast between the seasons in a year of temperate temperatures.
There are two non-religious Spring-related occasions that we particularly celebrate in our household, or at least we have for the past few years. One is the opening of our local Farmers' Market in Cary. While we do have access to fresh vegetables all year round at other Farmers' Markets in the area, the Cary market is shut down from December through March. So by the time the first Saturday in April rolls around, I can't wait to see all my farmer friends and start buying fresh, local produce again directly from the producers. And this year was extra special because, after a hiatus of a couple of years, the Cary Farmers' Market has once again move to downtown Cary, and is in even closer walking distance from my house than it was previously! That means a lot to me in my ongoing efforts to reduce our family's carbon footprint.
Another event of great note in our home is the first fresh local strawberries of the year. Every since reading Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma (yes, that book AGAIN, for my regular readers....what can I say, it changed my life), I no longer buy fresh strawberries except locally during our relatively short growing season in North Carolina (read the book to find out why). But I seriously love strawberries, so it is a big deal when they return to our diet, albiet for only a few, short, precious weeks. So only buying local strawberries in season has really raised my appreciation for this wonderful fruit that is gone all too soon.
But this year, for the first time since I've been shopping at the Farmers' Market, Market Opening Day and First Strawberry Day coincided! Apparently the mild winter has coaxed the local strawberries into blooming early. So, joy of joy, I bought a mess of them, and they will be part of our Easter celebration at our spiritual center (we are having an egg hunt for the children, but the eggs will contain fruit instead of candy) and our Easter dinner table. But I have already welcomed the strawberries by opening a bottle of champagne with a friend and drinking the sparkling wine with our first strawberries in the glass as well.
So pick what inspires you--your religious or spiritual tradition, Nature's beauty, the longer days, the warmer weather, or the return of the seasonal crops. Spring is great time to be thankful for all the wonderful things that this planet continues to provide us, despite our often not-too-great stewardship of its resources.
I'll end with a lovely video on Nature and gratitude that my friend Lorna shared with me. I hope you find it as inspiring as I did.
Enjoy!
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Is The Hunger Games Turning Students Off of STEM Education?
Are students turning away from pursuing careers in science and math because of books like The Hunger Games? Popular author Neal Stephenson thinks so. Stephenson argues that current science fiction writers depict such a dark and depressing picture of the future--like children being forced to fight to the death for the amusement of the ruling elite and for the subjugation of the laboring masses--that students are not inspired to be part of making that future come to be. If science, engineering, and math is going to create a future society like Panen in The Hunger Games, or the Realm in Incarceron, or post-apocalyptic Chicago in Divergent (gosh, haven't I written up that review? I'll have to do that), or dozens of other popular YA books, movies, and TV shows, why would students want to participate in that?
To Stephenson's mind, it all contributes to our society overarching problem, which is an inability to, in his word, "get big things done." So he has created an effort entitled the Hierarchy Project to convince science fiction writers to create some more optomistic visions of the future that would inspire students back into the world of science and math as a potential solution provider rather than a conveyor belt to our dystopic future. To hear more about his views on this topic, read his article on Innovation Starvation.
Stephenson is not the first person to raise these concerns. Indeed, my first-ever blog post, Are Bella and Edward LITERALLY Warping Your Adolescent's Brain, was about a conference at Cambridge that was examining whether dark themes in current YA literature were physically changing adolescent brains. But I thought it was a good follow-on to my earlier post this week about Neil deGrasse Tyson's concern that we have forgotten how to dream. I do think that perhaps the biggest problem is STEM education is our students lack of desire to pursue it, and I do think that these dark, science-enabled dystopias could be a part of the problem.
It also brings to mind a story about Martin Luther King, Jr. that I described in another earlier post. Nichelle Nicols, who played the African American communications officer Uhuru in the original television series of Star Trek, told of Dr. King telling her that Star Trek was the most important TV show at that time because it gave people a vision of the future world he was trying to create in his speeches--a place where people of all races (and even different planets) worked together in peace and respect to take on big challenges.
That was the time I was raised in. Star Trek may seem to today's eyes to be cheesy and bombastic, but it was unfailing optomistic about human potential enhanced by technology. Our children are growing up in times where it seems to be preferable to be vampires and werewolfs and zombies and such to becoming a scientist (unless you want to go into murder investigation, since I guess the numerous CSI shows require quite a number of scientist to analyze all that crime evidence the detective amass).
So I hope Stephenson and his Hierarchy Project help to encourage some writers to give our adolescent some less grim scenarios of their future. It may not be the biggest part of the solution to STEM education, but it sure couldn't hurt.
To Stephenson's mind, it all contributes to our society overarching problem, which is an inability to, in his word, "get big things done." So he has created an effort entitled the Hierarchy Project to convince science fiction writers to create some more optomistic visions of the future that would inspire students back into the world of science and math as a potential solution provider rather than a conveyor belt to our dystopic future. To hear more about his views on this topic, read his article on Innovation Starvation.
Stephenson is not the first person to raise these concerns. Indeed, my first-ever blog post, Are Bella and Edward LITERALLY Warping Your Adolescent's Brain, was about a conference at Cambridge that was examining whether dark themes in current YA literature were physically changing adolescent brains. But I thought it was a good follow-on to my earlier post this week about Neil deGrasse Tyson's concern that we have forgotten how to dream. I do think that perhaps the biggest problem is STEM education is our students lack of desire to pursue it, and I do think that these dark, science-enabled dystopias could be a part of the problem.
It also brings to mind a story about Martin Luther King, Jr. that I described in another earlier post. Nichelle Nicols, who played the African American communications officer Uhuru in the original television series of Star Trek, told of Dr. King telling her that Star Trek was the most important TV show at that time because it gave people a vision of the future world he was trying to create in his speeches--a place where people of all races (and even different planets) worked together in peace and respect to take on big challenges.
That was the time I was raised in. Star Trek may seem to today's eyes to be cheesy and bombastic, but it was unfailing optomistic about human potential enhanced by technology. Our children are growing up in times where it seems to be preferable to be vampires and werewolfs and zombies and such to becoming a scientist (unless you want to go into murder investigation, since I guess the numerous CSI shows require quite a number of scientist to analyze all that crime evidence the detective amass).
So I hope Stephenson and his Hierarchy Project help to encourage some writers to give our adolescent some less grim scenarios of their future. It may not be the biggest part of the solution to STEM education, but it sure couldn't hurt.
Monday, March 19, 2012
The Power of Dreams in Education
Why aren't US students going into careers in science, engineering, and math? That is a question we've been asking as a society ever since I was working professionally in Washington DC in education policy in the 1980s. There have been many proposed answers to that question, but mostly the blame as been laid on our education system. Our science and math education isn't rigorous enough, or it isn't concrete enough, or it isn't relevent enough, or it isn't hands-on enough, etc. etc. etc. So our latest response has been lots of government and private programs to improve education in what is now called STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics).
While I know science and math are tough disciplines--tough to learn and tough to teach (she says, having just completed teaching a hands-on physics class on light and optics that required lugging multiple sets of things for hands-on experiments to an outside classroom for five weeks)--and that we could definitely improve our science and math education, to my mind, that isn't the biggest problem with our current "brain drain" in STEM careers. The data I read indicates that most of "the best and the brightest"are choosing to go into fields other than math and science. That is to say, even if we could wave our magic wands and make our STEM education programs perfect, that isn't going to change the situation if students refuse to go into those programs in the first place.
There are many aspects to why American students aren't studying STEM. But one of the big ones, according to astrophysicist and science writer/media specialist Neil deGrasse Tyson, is that we, as a nation, have stopped dreaming about a better future and the important role science, math, and engineering have in getting us there.
I could say more, but Tyson himself says it so much better in the short video below, entitled "Why We Stopped Dreaming:"
There is no way I can improve on that. Except that I would say that it is not just limited to STEM. I grew up in the Washington DC area, where almost everyone there was employed in what we used to consider "public service." When I was growing up, working in Congress or the White House, the multiple court systems, the many federal agencies, the military complex built around the Pentagon, the related research institutes, the multiple non-profit public interest groups on all sorts of issues--all of those were honorable professions, and even though people found it a financial sacrifice, in terms of making a lower income than they might have had in private industry, it was worth it because they believed they were making a difference or playing a role in making the world safer, smarter, healthier, and better.
Now, after decades of people bashing "the government," our best and brightest don't want to work there either. Looking at the nastiness and frustration among our top politicians--the US Congress and White House--it is no wonder that our students don't want a career in politics. Education is another field where most of the public policy discussion is very negative, constantly highlighting all the perceived failures and rarely lauding the good work done day after day by millions of teachers across our country.
So what is left? Becoming an athlete, rock or rap star, an actor/actress or, even better/easier, becoming a celebrity through so-called "reality" TV?
This is a tough, tough problem, and I don't know how we are going to solve it as a society. But I know one thing. As teachers and as parents, we need to support our students in dreaming again. And I think it is particularly important in this middle school age--when they are old enough to understand and deal with some of the real substantive problems of our culture, but haven't yet experience so much frustration and inability to make a difference that they become cynical and indifferent. In our case, it is why we are so heavily invested in a effort called Healing Oceans Together, where the students wrote the following mission statement for their group:
While I know science and math are tough disciplines--tough to learn and tough to teach (she says, having just completed teaching a hands-on physics class on light and optics that required lugging multiple sets of things for hands-on experiments to an outside classroom for five weeks)--and that we could definitely improve our science and math education, to my mind, that isn't the biggest problem with our current "brain drain" in STEM careers. The data I read indicates that most of "the best and the brightest"are choosing to go into fields other than math and science. That is to say, even if we could wave our magic wands and make our STEM education programs perfect, that isn't going to change the situation if students refuse to go into those programs in the first place.
There are many aspects to why American students aren't studying STEM. But one of the big ones, according to astrophysicist and science writer/media specialist Neil deGrasse Tyson, is that we, as a nation, have stopped dreaming about a better future and the important role science, math, and engineering have in getting us there.
I could say more, but Tyson himself says it so much better in the short video below, entitled "Why We Stopped Dreaming:"
There is no way I can improve on that. Except that I would say that it is not just limited to STEM. I grew up in the Washington DC area, where almost everyone there was employed in what we used to consider "public service." When I was growing up, working in Congress or the White House, the multiple court systems, the many federal agencies, the military complex built around the Pentagon, the related research institutes, the multiple non-profit public interest groups on all sorts of issues--all of those were honorable professions, and even though people found it a financial sacrifice, in terms of making a lower income than they might have had in private industry, it was worth it because they believed they were making a difference or playing a role in making the world safer, smarter, healthier, and better.
Now, after decades of people bashing "the government," our best and brightest don't want to work there either. Looking at the nastiness and frustration among our top politicians--the US Congress and White House--it is no wonder that our students don't want a career in politics. Education is another field where most of the public policy discussion is very negative, constantly highlighting all the perceived failures and rarely lauding the good work done day after day by millions of teachers across our country.
So what is left? Becoming an athlete, rock or rap star, an actor/actress or, even better/easier, becoming a celebrity through so-called "reality" TV?
This is a tough, tough problem, and I don't know how we are going to solve it as a society. But I know one thing. As teachers and as parents, we need to support our students in dreaming again. And I think it is particularly important in this middle school age--when they are old enough to understand and deal with some of the real substantive problems of our culture, but haven't yet experience so much frustration and inability to make a difference that they become cynical and indifferent. In our case, it is why we are so heavily invested in a effort called Healing Oceans Together, where the students wrote the following mission statement for their group:
Healing Oceans Together (H2O) is a non-profit organization dedicated to preservation of the seas, raising public awareness about the oceans, and supporting the community through environmental education. Our organization is largely student-driven and is exceedingly resourceful. We are homeschoolers saving the world one step at a time, because we believe that everybody, working together, can make a difference.I have to end with quoting (yet AGAIN, for those who know me) from one of my favorite books of 2011, Okay For Now by Gary Schmidt. In this passage from the book, which is set in the 1960s, the junior high science teacher, Mr. Ferris, is talking to a group of incoming students.
"Within a year, possibly by next fall," he was saying, "something that has never before been done, will be done. NASA will be sending men to the moon. Think of that. Men who were once in classrooms like this one will leave their footprints on the lunar surface." He paused. I leaned in close against the wall so I could hear him. "That is why you are sitting here tonight, and why you will be coming here in the months ahead. You come to dream dream. You come to build fantastic castles into the air. And you come to learn how to build the foundations that make those castles real. When the men who will command that mission were boys your age, no one knew that they would walk on another world someday. No one knew. But in a few months, that's what will happen. So, twenty years from now, what will people say of you? 'No one knew then that this kid from Washington Irving Junior High School would grow up to do".....what? What castle will you build?"With all our focus in education on test scores and STEM initiatives and funding priorities, we are forgetting to encourage our students to dream big dreams. And what kind of a life are preparing them for without dreams? As Langston Hughes said in his poem, Dreams:
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Win $50,000 in the Google Science Fair
Do you know any teenagers (13-18) working on an awesome science project of their own design? If so, you may want to encourage them to enter it in the Google Science Fair, an international online science competition sponsored by Google in partnership with CERN, LEGO, National Geographic, and Scientific America.
The Google Science Fair follows the same basic rules and procedures as a physical science fair, but students must go the extra step of presenting their work through videos and other digital means (another good skill to be developing). Students from public, private, or home schools around the world can compete in the three age categories of 13-14, 15-16, and 17-18. There will be 15 global finalists who will be flown to a physical competition event at Google headquarters in July. The finalist winners in each age category are awarded a $25,000 scholarship and the opportunity to engage in a high level science research experience, while the Grand Prize winner will get a $50,000 and a National Geographic scientific expedition to the Galapagos. There is also a $50,000 prize for the Science in Action winner, the project that best addresses a social, environmental, or health issue in a way that makes a difference in the lives of a group or community.
For more information or to sign up, visit the Google Science Fair website. However, projects are due by April 1, 2012, so your student scientists will have to submit their work soon.
For an inspirational video Google produced encouraging student science, click below:
And to hear more about the rules of the competition, watch the following video:
The Google Science Fair follows the same basic rules and procedures as a physical science fair, but students must go the extra step of presenting their work through videos and other digital means (another good skill to be developing). Students from public, private, or home schools around the world can compete in the three age categories of 13-14, 15-16, and 17-18. There will be 15 global finalists who will be flown to a physical competition event at Google headquarters in July. The finalist winners in each age category are awarded a $25,000 scholarship and the opportunity to engage in a high level science research experience, while the Grand Prize winner will get a $50,000 and a National Geographic scientific expedition to the Galapagos. There is also a $50,000 prize for the Science in Action winner, the project that best addresses a social, environmental, or health issue in a way that makes a difference in the lives of a group or community.
For more information or to sign up, visit the Google Science Fair website. However, projects are due by April 1, 2012, so your student scientists will have to submit their work soon.
For an inspirational video Google produced encouraging student science, click below:
And to hear more about the rules of the competition, watch the following video:
Monday, March 12, 2012
Curriculum Resource: TED-Ed
Regular readers of this blog know that I am a great fan of TED, which shares "Ideas Worth Spreading" by posting FREE videos of some of the leading thinkers and doers across the world as they give presentations on important topics--all in 10 minutes or less.
Today, TED launched a new initiative called TED-Ed that will bring the TED philosophy to education (although I've used plenty of TED videos in my lessons already). TED-ED is a TED You Tube video channel dedicated specifically to "Lessons Worth Spreading." That is, TED-Ed posts more FREE videos of some exemplary lessons that TED has enhanced by adding appropriate animations or other features (when necessary--some talks are fine on their own). Right now, TED-Ed has just a handfull of videos, but by next month, they plan to add lesson plans and tools that allow teachers to customized the videos to their own classes (such as embedding questions or comments, etc.). They are also accepting nominations for outstanding educators or animators to use in the project, as well as suggestions for desired lessons.
TED-Ed is geared to the high school level and above, but I think the videos I watched would be appropriate for mature middle school students as well. But check them out and judge for yourself. For example, in honor of my middle schooler who has been enthralled with the deep sea since he was 2 years old, watch the TED-Ed video below on "Deep Ocean Mysteries and Wonders:"
Today, TED launched a new initiative called TED-Ed that will bring the TED philosophy to education (although I've used plenty of TED videos in my lessons already). TED-ED is a TED You Tube video channel dedicated specifically to "Lessons Worth Spreading." That is, TED-Ed posts more FREE videos of some exemplary lessons that TED has enhanced by adding appropriate animations or other features (when necessary--some talks are fine on their own). Right now, TED-Ed has just a handfull of videos, but by next month, they plan to add lesson plans and tools that allow teachers to customized the videos to their own classes (such as embedding questions or comments, etc.). They are also accepting nominations for outstanding educators or animators to use in the project, as well as suggestions for desired lessons.
TED-Ed is geared to the high school level and above, but I think the videos I watched would be appropriate for mature middle school students as well. But check them out and judge for yourself. For example, in honor of my middle schooler who has been enthralled with the deep sea since he was 2 years old, watch the TED-Ed video below on "Deep Ocean Mysteries and Wonders:"
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Yenka: 3-D Simulation Software to Create Interactive Models in Science, Math, and Technology
I've been teaching physics this semester, and in my search for resources, I stumbled upon this incredible resource. Yenka is some very powerful 3-D simulation software that allows you to model all sorts of topics related to science, technology, math, and computer programming. For example, in the area of physics I'm teaching (light and optics), Yenka has some pre-built virtual labs that allow you or a student to manipulate concave or convex lenses to see how the light rays travel through them and how near or far from the lens you must be for the picture to be clear and focused. They also have models for the colours of light (it was developed by a Scottish firm, so the spellings are British rather than American), for fiber optics, for light refraction, microscopes and telescopes, and several others. But they also have lots of other ones relating to electricity, sound, forces, and other physical concept, plus another whole load of models for chemistry.
Then there is math, which has over 200 models about numbers, geometry, measurements, and statistics. In the technology section...well, I can't even understand what their description of things you can do mean, but apparently you can "Design and test analogue and digital electronic circuits, convert them to PCB layouts, and program PIC or PICAXE microcontrollers." Whatever, it sounds like powerful stuff. Finally, in computing, they have what is supposed to be a simple programming technique for manipulating 3-D animated character using flowcharts (although more sophisticated program require an upgrade to some other software they have).
And the REALLY good news is that all this powerful software is FREE--BUT, only for using at home. For teachers to use the software at school, they must buy a personal or an institution license. However, for teachers who want to play with it at home to try out some ideas, or for parents who want to supplement what their children are learning at school, it is fantastic. Plus, it does say specifically that the free license is available to homeschoolers. Yippee!
So it really is a wonderful resource for creating all sorts of different simulations and interactive virtual exercises in lots of areas of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) education. To download your FREE at-home license to try it out, visit the Yenka website.
Then there is math, which has over 200 models about numbers, geometry, measurements, and statistics. In the technology section...well, I can't even understand what their description of things you can do mean, but apparently you can "Design and test analogue and digital electronic circuits, convert them to PCB layouts, and program PIC or PICAXE microcontrollers." Whatever, it sounds like powerful stuff. Finally, in computing, they have what is supposed to be a simple programming technique for manipulating 3-D animated character using flowcharts (although more sophisticated program require an upgrade to some other software they have).
And the REALLY good news is that all this powerful software is FREE--BUT, only for using at home. For teachers to use the software at school, they must buy a personal or an institution license. However, for teachers who want to play with it at home to try out some ideas, or for parents who want to supplement what their children are learning at school, it is fantastic. Plus, it does say specifically that the free license is available to homeschoolers. Yippee!
So it really is a wonderful resource for creating all sorts of different simulations and interactive virtual exercises in lots of areas of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) education. To download your FREE at-home license to try it out, visit the Yenka website.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
The Great Backyard Bird Count
So many things to celebrate this weekend! But I wanted to mention one that can be one of the most educational of all, which is The Great Backyard Bird Count.
The GBBC is an event sponsored every year over Presidents Day weekend by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Audubon Society, and the Bird Studies of Canada. For the Friday through Monday of that weekend, they ask people all over North America to count the largest number of birds of each species they see while walking, hiking, and birdwatching. They compile them all into statewide and national lists to see how the bird populations seem to be doing in the U.S. and Canada.
The great thing about this project is that you don't need to be an accomplished birdwatcher to participate. They have a lot of tools built into their website to help you learn about and to recognize the birds you are most likely to be seeing, based on your vicinity (zip code and/or habitat). You input your information about where you are birdwatching, and they come up with lists of birds that are indigenous to that area. You can click on specific birds to see a picture and to read more about them to decide if that is the bird you saw, if you aren't already familiar with the species.
If you are interested in going in more depth about birdwatching, they have a great resource on Building Skills that teaches you ways to identify birds more accurately. They have an entire section on GBBC for Kids, which not only provides simple information and some puzzles and crafts, as well as some games that are not only kind of interesting to do, but is building their online bird identification software so it will be better at helping unfamiliar birders to correctly identify the birds they see. Finally, it is a way to have your children assist with an international science data collection effort, and see how their contributions at a local level help build a national database.
We are not great at bird identification. However, we try to do this regularly, and every year we learn to identify at least one or two more birds than we did the year before. And here in the Triangle NC area, the weather has been glorious to be out with the birds.
You can still participate today and tomorrow (Sunday and Monday), so I encourage you and your middle schoolers to take a walk, or to watch your bird feeders for a sustained period, and become part of one of the largest citizen science activities in the country. Of course, the resources are available year round, so they are good to know about whenever you have a question about birds. But it is fun to contribute to a large group project like this. You can even print out a certificate to demonstrate your participation, and may even win a prize given to randomly-selected birdwatchers.
The GBBC is an event sponsored every year over Presidents Day weekend by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Audubon Society, and the Bird Studies of Canada. For the Friday through Monday of that weekend, they ask people all over North America to count the largest number of birds of each species they see while walking, hiking, and birdwatching. They compile them all into statewide and national lists to see how the bird populations seem to be doing in the U.S. and Canada.
The great thing about this project is that you don't need to be an accomplished birdwatcher to participate. They have a lot of tools built into their website to help you learn about and to recognize the birds you are most likely to be seeing, based on your vicinity (zip code and/or habitat). You input your information about where you are birdwatching, and they come up with lists of birds that are indigenous to that area. You can click on specific birds to see a picture and to read more about them to decide if that is the bird you saw, if you aren't already familiar with the species.
If you are interested in going in more depth about birdwatching, they have a great resource on Building Skills that teaches you ways to identify birds more accurately. They have an entire section on GBBC for Kids, which not only provides simple information and some puzzles and crafts, as well as some games that are not only kind of interesting to do, but is building their online bird identification software so it will be better at helping unfamiliar birders to correctly identify the birds they see. Finally, it is a way to have your children assist with an international science data collection effort, and see how their contributions at a local level help build a national database.
We are not great at bird identification. However, we try to do this regularly, and every year we learn to identify at least one or two more birds than we did the year before. And here in the Triangle NC area, the weather has been glorious to be out with the birds.
You can still participate today and tomorrow (Sunday and Monday), so I encourage you and your middle schoolers to take a walk, or to watch your bird feeders for a sustained period, and become part of one of the largest citizen science activities in the country. Of course, the resources are available year round, so they are good to know about whenever you have a question about birds. But it is fun to contribute to a large group project like this. You can even print out a certificate to demonstrate your participation, and may even win a prize given to randomly-selected birdwatchers.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
This Weekend Is the Last Chance to Join in the Sea Slug Lovefest!
As I mentioned in an earlier post, my son's middle school environmental group, Healing Oceans Together, is running a FREE online contest entitled The Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest. They are asking people to vote for which of eight finalists is the most beautiful sea slug--judging not only on its appearance, but also its cool features. Click here to participate--it is anonymous and only takes a few minutes....ESPECIALLY if you are from one of these states:
- Idaho
- Kansas
- North Dakota
- Oklahoma
- South Dakota
- West Virginia
- Wyoming
Those are the only states that they haven't received any visits from, and they are really trying to get at least one vote from all 50 states (and we've got the District of Columbia, since that is where my father lives). So if you can, please vote so they can get the most participation possible. But the deadline is tomorrow, Sunday, February 12, so please act soon.
H2O also just put on two free educational workshops for the community about sea slugs. About 68 people participated in the workshops, held at the libraries in Raleigh and Apex, NC. In addition to scientific information about sea slugs and how people can help heal the oceans, the workshops featured making your own sea slug out of polymer clay or playdough (for the littler students), making sea slug valentines, playing games, and listening to sea slug stories. It drew a diverse crowd, and it was great to see the teens working with the toddlers!
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Please Vote in the Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest
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| Photography by Steve Childs used under Creative Commons license |
These are just some of the contestants in The Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest. This competition is an online poll being held by my son's environmental education and awareness group, Healing Oceans Together (H2O).
The goal of the The Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest is to raise awareness about this fascinating and often overlooked inhabitants of seas all around the world. The middle school-aged students who make up H2O believe that as people learn more about some of the more numerous but less publicized underwater creatures and come to appreciate them, they will be more willing to take action to help protect our global oceans.
Because they love sea slugs (the common name for the animal classification known as nudibranchs), they are holding The Great Sea Slug Beauty Contest in honor of Valentines Day. So between now and Sunday, February 12, they are asking people of all ages to
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| Glaucus atlanticus © Taro Taylor, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic |
The winner will be announced on Valentines Day, February 14, 2012.
They also have a map of visitors, and are hoping to get responses from all the different areas in the world where sea slugs live. Since sea slugs live in almost all oceans and seas, that means pretty much from everywhere!
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| Photography by Patrick Krug used under Creative Commons license |
It is free and anonymous, and participating in the poll will not put you on any mailing list or anything like that (although if you are interested in keeping up with what is going on with this middle school-aged coop, you can sign up on their mailing list here).
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| Photo by: John Albers-Mead by Creative Commons license |
Let's help these middle schoolers, who believe they can make a difference in the world, by generating some world-wide love for these under-appreciated wonders in our waters!
Saturday, January 14, 2012
FREE Physics Game Online: Steampunk
My son will be doing several physics classes this semester, so I'll be trying to supplement them with some additional physics at home. I recently found a fun game to practice some of Newton's laws, and with a stylish theme to boot! Plus, it's a FREE online game, so the price is right.
The game is called Steampunk, and so it has the Victorian-era-meets-high-technology look about it. The aim of the game is to break pieces of wood in such a way that they release balls, explode bombs, swing pendula and the like to move the GOOD pentagonal-shaped guy to safe ground and the BAD pentagonal-shaped guy to unsafe areas (like the water and gears, etc.) The components move in the ways predicted by Newton's law, so it is a good way to model concepts like momentum and such.
The game is not designed to teach physics, nor does it say anything or explain anything about Newton's laws or other concepts in physics. However, playing around with the movement puzzles presented does develop an intuitive feel for Newtonian physics. It also requires systematic thinking and the ability to plan ahead (if I blow up this, it will release that ball, but I have to wait until that board swings into place for the ball to move to the next level, ect.)
So it's not Victorian-era rocket science. But it is a fun game to model and test your physical predictions.
You can play the game by clicking here.
The game is called Steampunk, and so it has the Victorian-era-meets-high-technology look about it. The aim of the game is to break pieces of wood in such a way that they release balls, explode bombs, swing pendula and the like to move the GOOD pentagonal-shaped guy to safe ground and the BAD pentagonal-shaped guy to unsafe areas (like the water and gears, etc.) The components move in the ways predicted by Newton's law, so it is a good way to model concepts like momentum and such.
The game is not designed to teach physics, nor does it say anything or explain anything about Newton's laws or other concepts in physics. However, playing around with the movement puzzles presented does develop an intuitive feel for Newtonian physics. It also requires systematic thinking and the ability to plan ahead (if I blow up this, it will release that ball, but I have to wait until that board swings into place for the ball to move to the next level, ect.)
So it's not Victorian-era rocket science. But it is a fun game to model and test your physical predictions.
You can play the game by clicking here.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Who is Nicolas Steno?
I know, it sounds like that movie, The Usual Suspects, where they ask "Who is Keyser Soze?" But that is the question I asked when I saw the beautiful Google Doodle this morning.
There have been lots lately, but I thought this one was particularly eye-catching. Plus, when I check out most of the Google Doodles, I know something about the subject. But Nicolas Steno? Never heard of him.
Of course, that led to me reading hyperlinks to information about the man and his work, which was all interesting and ended up diverting me for far too long. But how great it is that Google throughs these little diversions at us. I have my issues with Google as a company, but I love the whimsy that is illustrated in the Google Doodle program.
If you happen not to know about Nicolas Steno either, you can watcht the Google Doodle video below:
There have been lots lately, but I thought this one was particularly eye-catching. Plus, when I check out most of the Google Doodles, I know something about the subject. But Nicolas Steno? Never heard of him.
Of course, that led to me reading hyperlinks to information about the man and his work, which was all interesting and ended up diverting me for far too long. But how great it is that Google throughs these little diversions at us. I have my issues with Google as a company, but I love the whimsy that is illustrated in the Google Doodle program.
If you happen not to know about Nicolas Steno either, you can watcht the Google Doodle video below:
Friday, December 9, 2011
Curriculum Resource: Teaching Evolution
So if you are a family that doesn't believe in and/or doesn't teach evolution, then you want to skip this post.
But for those who do...
I found a great series of lesson plans about teaching evolution on a website hosted by Indiana University. A heads up: these lessons were developed for teaching high school biology. However, the authors say they could be done with some modifications at the middle school level, and I'm certainly finding some resources that are appropriate for our middle school Ocean Studies coop this year.
There are over 50 lesson plans or mini lessons that are available on line, along with some titles that I suppose they are still developing. It is broken into two big categories:
But for those who do...
I found a great series of lesson plans about teaching evolution on a website hosted by Indiana University. A heads up: these lessons were developed for teaching high school biology. However, the authors say they could be done with some modifications at the middle school level, and I'm certainly finding some resources that are appropriate for our middle school Ocean Studies coop this year.
There are over 50 lesson plans or mini lessons that are available on line, along with some titles that I suppose they are still developing. It is broken into two big categories:
- Evolution Patterns
- Evolution Processes
Subcategories under Evolution Patterns are:
- Geological/Paleontological Patterns: General
- Human Evolution Patterns
- Classification, Hierarchy, Relationships
The subcategories under Evolution Processes are:
- Adaptations, Imperfections, Contrivances
- Variation and Natural Selection
- Speciation
- Macroevolution
So it is a nice, comprehensive approach to the topic, it seems to me. I haven't looked at all the lessons, but most of the ones I did read had an experiment or hands-on component. Not all of them are suitable for an at-home science lab, but many of them can be done in a homeschool setting.
So check them out here.
Monday, December 5, 2011
FREE Middle School Physics Kit Available
Here is another wonderful resource for middle school education. For the past several years, the American Physical Society (APS) has run a program called Physics Quest. In it, middle school students try to solve an applied physics problem, using a FREE curriculum and materials kits provided by APS.
The Physics Quests are presented as a problem within a story that is described in a comic book format. In the earlier years, the stories centered around early physics innovators, such as Ben Franklin and Nicola Tesla. For the past few years, the stories are set in modern settings, with a middle school student with extraordinary abilities (named Lucy Hene, AKA Spectra) as the protagonist.
Previous years have examined such physical topics as lasers and magnets, but this one relates to temperature and the weather/global warming issue. Students are led through four experiments that reveal clues to solve the puzzle of the extreme temperature/weather at Spectra's middle school. Best of all, if you register with APS before all the kits are gone, they will even send you a Physics Quest set with the storybook and the equipment you need to conduct the experiments.
We've done this for the past couple of years, and found it to be a fun addition to our other physics studies. While it can be done in school, the organizers also encourage other educators, including homeschoolers, Scout troops, and after school program coordinators, to participate as well.
To find out more about this year's Quest, see the APS website Physics Quest page. Or, click here to register to receive a kit to do this year's Quest.
The Physics Quests are presented as a problem within a story that is described in a comic book format. In the earlier years, the stories centered around early physics innovators, such as Ben Franklin and Nicola Tesla. For the past few years, the stories are set in modern settings, with a middle school student with extraordinary abilities (named Lucy Hene, AKA Spectra) as the protagonist.
Previous years have examined such physical topics as lasers and magnets, but this one relates to temperature and the weather/global warming issue. Students are led through four experiments that reveal clues to solve the puzzle of the extreme temperature/weather at Spectra's middle school. Best of all, if you register with APS before all the kits are gone, they will even send you a Physics Quest set with the storybook and the equipment you need to conduct the experiments.
We've done this for the past couple of years, and found it to be a fun addition to our other physics studies. While it can be done in school, the organizers also encourage other educators, including homeschoolers, Scout troops, and after school program coordinators, to participate as well.
To find out more about this year's Quest, see the APS website Physics Quest page. Or, click here to register to receive a kit to do this year's Quest.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Curriculum Resource: Thanksgiving Science From Science Jim
Here's a little bit of learning to sneak in for the holiday. Our favorite online science educator, Science Jim, has posted a video of a class he did last year on Thanksgiving topics, covering topics like whether eating turkey really makes you sleepy and did Ben Franklin really try to combine turkey and electricity. Just click below to sneak in a little science along with all the good food!
Science Jim Show: Thanksgiving and Ben Franklin! from Science Jim on Vimeo.
Science Jim Show: Thanksgiving and Ben Franklin! from Science Jim on Vimeo.
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