Curiosity, Sir Edmund, Mr. Wizard and Kids

Why did Ed Hillary climb Mt. Everest? Sir John Hunt, who organized the successful 1953 expedition, said “it was the possibility of entering the unknown… to solve a problem which has long resisted the skill and persistence of others”. They were, in a word, curious. The death of Sir Edmund at age 88 reminded me of why I owned Sir John Hunt’s 1954 book: Everest and its conquest stimulated my curiosity and later my own interest in outdoor activities and the natural world. Now, as a teacher who is passionate about science, I am reminded of the power of one person to stimulate curiosity, a career, or even a theory. Another curious person was Don Hebert, aka Mr. Wizard, who enthralled families in the early days of television with his inquiry based, kid friendly demonstrations and demystifications of the physical and natural world. Like me, Dr. Frank Wilczek, MIT physicist, watched hundreds of Mr. Wizards. His thanks to the great stimulators of curiosity can be found on page 8 of the January, 2008 ‘Physics Today’. Curiosity may have killed a few cats, but think of all the lucky ones who got a meal!

Finding An Education President

New Year's resolution: decide on a presidential candidate who will make education a priority, particularly STEM education.

The end of 2007 brought a terrible holiday present to the science community in the United States. Almost all research venues were handed budgets which will reduce the ability to fund primary research across the board. Living in a college town and working with many graduate students as a volunteer has made me aware of the tenuous nature of life as a professional student. Years of low pay and long hours devoted to a very small slice of the science question may lead to a poorly paid job in a grant funded project. This treatment of our STEM elite is not a good model to present to children who will inherit the responsibilities and challenges of the competitive future. My choice for president will have the following as fundamental tenets:

1. Eliminate NCLB and its 'lower the bar' mentality. Replace it with targeted support for failing schools and increased support for magnet schools in science and the arts.
2. Make research in the sciences a national priority. Innovation is our greatest asset!
3. Provide incentives for our best and brightest to become and remain teachers.
4. Reduce the burden of higher education for the middle class. Provide incentives for students selecting STEM majors.
5. Include elementary educators in efforts to integrate STEM topics into the curriculum. If the soil is not prepared, the seeds will not grow!
6. Connect an emphasis on education to solutions for Global Climate change and promoting sustainable practices.

I recommend reading Bill Richardson's white paper 'Making America's Schools Work'. If you agree with anything I've said so far, you will find many points I agree with.

One resolution done!

Huckabee is a huckster disguised as a huckleberry..

Gov. Huckabee is a photogenic and sweet tongued fellow who will surely charm many people who are looking for an excuse not to engage in the tough work of observing and thinking about the world. I respect any person's right to believe what they wish. However, I do not think that belief in pseudoscience qualifies one to be in any sort of leadership role which touches on education. While a sitting president has little to do with educational policy, he/she sets the tone for discourse on the topic and can be a cheerleader for initiatives to improve what we are doing. We have had seven long years where decisions were not made using the data at hand. It has been said that the current president has relied largely on guidance based on his beliefs. The result is that we are reviled by over a billion muslims and laughed at by our EU peers. In science, we have let ourselves drop to the bottom third of the developed barrel. I would propose to Gov. Huckabee that if there ever is/was an intelligent designer, he/she/it used good old data driven scientific method to guide things to where they are. I also suspect that the designer might have already finished and is observing us to see if we have the intellect to be included in further experiments. The only candidate with an actual track record on education is Gov. Bill Richardson who helped pump 700Million$ into New Mexico's educational system. Money isn't the only answer, but you don't need to do an experiment to realize that lack of monetary support does not work at all. I am appalled that my own teacher's organization, NEA-NH has endorsed Huckabee. He is a populist candidate with nothing in his experience for science, education, or the combination of the two!

BTW: credit to the Charlotte Conservative News for the 'holy mike' image

2006 PISA Science Assessment Results

On December 4, the OECD released the 2006 PISA assessments which focused on science and math. Sadly, the summary results placed the US below the average for the 57 countries taking the test. At 29th overall, it doesn’t appear that we will be relinquishing our love for creationism and astrology any time soon. China and India were not included in the assessment, but they are the two countries which have benefited the most by the failure of our system to entice students into STEM careers. The complete OECD US briefing can be found at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/30/17/39703267.pdf
and does have some important nuancing for policy makers. Apologists for the bad results are claiming that other countries ‘hide’ their poor students in vocational pools which aren’t included in the sampling. One valid point is the fact that high scoring countries tend to be small, homogeneous entities in the developed cadre of countries. Countering that fact is the idea that the US is really 50 such entities – why can’t we get our act together? New Mexico is one state which has pulled itself up some distance with a 700 million dollar educational investment pushed by former governor and presidential candidate Bill Richardson. It can be done. Here in New Hampshire, we still rely on the shrinking resources of property owners and lottery tickets to prop up the system. We do OK, primarily by being a great place to live and attracting good teachers willing to be paid poorly. Unfortunately, our higher ed system is languishing with the same number of full professors now as in the 1960s, but triple the student load. The University of New Hampshire has a nationally recognized athletic program which loses a million a year, but has a shrinking number of students enrolling in STEM fields which get grants and outside funding. Maybe we are counting on a quarterback to be able to throw a satellite into orbit?

What is Technology (elementary)?

As I prepare for the Christa McAuliffe Technology Conference, I have been thinking about the appropriate emphasis for technology in the K-5 years. Wikipedia defines technology as “…a broad concept that deals with a species' usage and knowledge of tools and crafts, and how it affects a species' ability to control and adapt to its environment.” A New Caledonian crow has been observed using technology for the first time (National Geographic 2002). It was observed bending a wire to get food from a hard to reach location. The old adage, necessity is the mother of invention, is appropriate to the process of developing and applying technology. Paper is one of the technologies an elementary student must master early in the educational process. There are tools related to using the paper such as, pens, pencils, crayons, scissors and glue. Each tool represents its own technology. Paper can be folded into artwork, airplanes, and booklets. All of these are obvious in their necessity to the learning process. As I observe students struggling with scissors in the fourth grade, I wonder about the place of electronic gadgetry at that age. Before using the electric pencil sharpener, the old hand crank type must be used to appreciate the consistency achieved with the electric one. The same goes for an electric stapler, calculator, and computer. Spell check is great, but not until a student knows the alphabet inside and out and the basic rules of spelling. A calculator saves time, but ignorance of multiplication facts could lead to a compounding of errors. I would make the case that an invention looking for a use is really a toy. The process of inventing based on need is one which must be learned, and the earlier the better. Perhaps the process of developing and implementing technology is where the emphasis should be for our K-5 students, saving the expensive electronic toys for a time where the necessity is obvious.

Integrating Knowledge

One of the daunting tasks for anyone purporting to be a teacher is the process of distilling what you know to a form which is appropriate for your audience. Mahesh Sharma, Chancellor of Cambridge College in Boston, states that a teacher should have two years of mastery beyond the grade they wish to teach. But mastery of a subject area is only part of the equation for stimulating growth of thinking. The other piece is what I call the integration process with the whole of what we experience. The ability to integrate knowledge allows insightful questions to be asked, disparate pieces to be collected into a creative whole, and a deep appreciation for the complexity of being. I recently went on a 'walk in the woods' with a person who has expertise encompassing the field of ecology and many subjects connected with understanding how ecological processes work. The person is Tom Wessels, associated with Antioch NE College, and the location was Crawford Notch. Tom displays the depth of kowledge which comes with sustained inquisitiveness and long experience. It goes beyond wisdom, in a sense, in that Tom's insights also have a bit of ground truth from data built into them. Integrating knowledge with experience is a goal for an elementary teacher, but my observation is that teachers who embody that tendency in their thinking unconsciously transfer integrative principles through modeling. Tom has a few of his musings available as books. is latest "The Myth of Progress" is appropo of this year of electioneering and decisions driven by advertising rather than data. Check it out!

Parent Involvement In Science Education

While teachers in most elementary schools see their students for four to five hours per day, parents influence the remaining eight to ten 'awake' hours. Parents have many choices for dealing with these hours, from day care to sports teams, but for the pre-school to primary age group, parents are still the main event in many cases. A recent trip to Italy highlighted the different attitude to parental involvement in early childhood education, which is heavily subsidized. To offset the cost and improve the experience, parents are an integral part of the early school day. Parents are exposed to trained educators who model appropriate teaching and behavioral techniques, and children get to socialize and learn from a developmentally correct curriculum. Exploring the natural world is an integral part of the process. Without early experiences, later observations will be meaningless and the ability to make generalizations and extend concepts will be limited. The Italian model won't be coming soon to the US, but there are many excellent science and natural history activities available to parents who know where to find them. I hope the interested reader will check out our page which begins to catalogue some of the many cool things you can do with your child which will support their natural talents as budding scientists!