Birds of a Feather

Flock Together

Hello from CAST (Conference for the Advancement of Science Teaching), the Texas science teachers' annual conference!  It's so invigorating to meet up with other teachers who share my passion for science!

I've spent the last two days learning with other teachers.  As I sent friends and colleagues photos and brief notes about what I was doing, I realized, a little guiltily, that it felt like playing (a happy distraction from post-election news).  But that's what I love about science (and why this English major has spent so many hours in science workshops over the years).  Science is messy.  It's a verb, not a noun.  Instead of sitting back and passively absorbing knowledge, you get your hands in there and you DO.  So the joy of discovery that comes with learning feels like play.  I was tired at the end of the day because I had spent so much time engrossed in learning and thinking, but the kind of learning we were doing is engaging, stimulating, and fun in a deeply satisfying way, something like what Mihaly Csikszentmihályi refers to as "flow."

I think that's why children love science so much.  Wondering and experimenting is innately human.  From the time we are babies, we wonder, "What if?" and drop something onto the floor.  A kind parent or caregiver retrieves the object, and the child tests the results again . . . and again.  The progress of a walk is slow because a toddler pauses often to squat to the ground and examine something closely.  At its best, learning pairs natural curiosity with the joyful nature of discovery.

Here's a sample of how I spent my time:

In Dissect, Discover & Diagram an Ecosystem, we dissected and compared a pair of owl pellets (one from the Northwest region of the U.S. and one from the Southeast).  SO much fun!  Each owl pellet contains an entire skeleton.  Ward's Science has put together a dichotomous identification key to help students identify the organism contained in their owl pellet.  The children can then draw conclusions about differences between the diet of owls in different regions of the United States.
This activity integrates so much science: food chains and food webs, predator/prey relationships, skeletal anatomy, measurement, regional differences in animals, adaptations, and more.

Plus, it is great fun to dig through a furry
pellet and discover all the tiny bones of a rodent skeleton.  You know you're in the right company when you confess to a stranger that you have re-purposed roadkill to model vertebrate paleontology field work and the resulting "Oh, wow" is more impressed enthusiasm than fear and revulsion.  :)


At the end of the workshop, I managed to scavenge enough probes, rulers, and plastic trays for all five of my Cooperative Investigation science groups.

At Flood! A Catastrophic Event in the Watershed, we experimented with the porosity and permeability of different-sized sediment particles and also got to see this incredible Stormwater Floodplain model.  Watch the video!  What a powerful tool!  If only I had an unlimited budget, along with unlimited storage space.

Bringing STEM to Light: We experimented with red, green, and blue light, overlapping all three and then attempting to sort M&Ms by color under different-colored lights.  I am so excited to receive this kit for free and take it home to share it with my students!













Paper Airplane Investigation: A STEM workshop on the design and flight path of paper airplanes

I wish I had a good photo of teachers throwing paper airplanes all over the conference room!

At Go Go Gadget Girls, we learned about an after-school STEM club for girls, and we designed and launched straw rockets.

At Texas Through Time: LoneStar Geology, Landscapes, and Resources, the Texas Bureau of Economic Geology announced the publication of this new book and introduced this amazing "Great Places" to view Texas geology online resource.

Carolina offered a Hands-On Science with Classroom Critters workshop in which we played with bugs.  First, we popped open a tube of termites.  It turns out that certain pen inks mimic termite pheromones, and they will follow the path of a line of this ink on paper.  Wow!

Next up were roly-polies (aka pillbugs or doodlebugs).  We placed the terrestrial isopods in the center of a Carolina "Choice Chamber" and added a variable (a heat pack underneath one chamber or covering one chamber to create darkness) to one chamber.  Then we watched to see if they showed a preference.

Finally, we measured the mass Bessbugs are capable of pulling.  They are impressively strong!







Two workshops featured actual field work, using the habitat along the river that flows in the Grotto area under the Convention Center.  The first was Project ACORN: Place-based STEM Project 3rd-8th Grade.  This is a group of students who grow and plant seedlings of native trees.  They also conduct field work at their planting sites, measuring and recording observations of air, water, and soil temperatures, cloud cover and cloud type, dissolved oxygen, pH levels, and turbidity of water, GPS, rainfall, wind speed and direction within the local ecosystem over time.  For the conference, we were able to observe local students collecting this data on a field trip at the Convention Center.

Another workshop, Pond's Life, used the same outdoor area to practice collection and identification of aquatic macroinvertebrates and to teach about their use as water quality indicators.



Honestly, I avoided the workshops promoting a proliferation of computerized/digital science programs (EduSmart, STEMscopes--a major sponsor of the conference, it does have a hands-on component if the school pays for the materials kit and the teacher uses it, BirdBrain Science, TI-Nspire's "Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse," ExploreLearning, and more), featuring simulations, "interactivity," vocabulary modules, and videos.  Maybe I am old-fashioned (or just plain old!), but I think it has more to do with a deep conviction that brains-under-construction need direct engagement with the world around them.  Dr. Maria Montessori wrote, “The hands are the instruments of man’s intelligence” (The Absorbent Mind).  I understand that digital simulations save districts money in materials and save teachers time in set-up of materials and clean-up of messes, but children need to put their hands on real objects and observe real living organisms.  Children need to get their hands dirty and engage in direct experiences rather than virtual experiences on screens.

Next year, CAST comes to Houston!  I'm thinking about offering a workshop on field work with children.