Technoscience

Brainstorming Electricity

Screenshot from K12 Online Conference

This week I have been excited to be informed that my proposal to present at the K12 Online Conference was accepted. The conference is in it’s fifth year and again promises a diverse range of international presenters, distinguished key-note speakers and excellent opportunities for collaborative professional development. The pre-conference week starts on 11th October with Dean Shareski, whose very name is the embodiment of what the conference is all about – sharing. This free conference, with the theme “Cultivate the Future!”, includes some truly inspirational and innovative users of technology in education, such as:

• Julie Lindsay
• Kim Cofino
• Tony Vincent
• Chris Betcher

I am truly honored and humbled to be included in a line-up with such outstanding leaders in education. If you are planning on participating in any part of the conference, please leave a comment and if you are interested in my “Week in a Classroom” let me know what your specific interests are, so I can tailor my presentation accordingly.

Our next unit of work in Year 6/7  Science will be Light and Sound. We will learn about luminous, incandescent and fluorescent objects and bioluminescent organisms (such as glow worms, some deep-sea fish and phosphoresence in the ocean.) We will also find out about the structure and function of your eyes and ears. We will find out the answers to the following questions:

• What makes a rainbow?
• What are polarised sunglasses?
• Why can’t you see through tinted windows?
• How do some animals see in the dark?
• Why can’t anyone hear you scream in space?
• What is a wave?
• Why can’t humans hear sounds that some animals can?

 ”How Stuff Works” is a great site for finding out how light and sound work. Some good resources from Scholastic StudyJams here. Recent article from New Scientist about how brain damage can have interesting effects on eyesight. The Bioluminescence Web site has some great information about the living organisms that emit light. Here are some links to some good Sound and Light Experiments you can do at home at Fizzics Education and ACS Chemistry for Life.

On Friday, about 50 of our Year 6/7 students had the opportunity to trial the Ultranet at Hawkesdale p12 College. Our school agreed to participate in the DEECD trial, involving 7,000 students from around the state being logged on simultaneously. They had several simple tasks to complete, including opening and customizing their Express page, writing a short profile and finding and joining a Collaborative Space. Apart from a few password and uncharged netbook issues, students were able to help each other complete these tasks with very little assistance from teachers. In contrast to Monday 9th August, this trial demonstrated that the Ultranet can be  a stable and user-friendly platform for students and teachers to work together.

So, our learner drivers have had their first lesson in the Volvo – they weren’t at all nervous, or excited, they just took it in their stride. For them, the ultranet is nothing more than a tiny part of cyberspace, where their teachers may encourage them to visit. Sure, it is a safe and secure place, where students can practise the skills of being collaborative learners and global citizens. However, I believe our students have access to very powerful tools and with that privilege comes the responsibility of sharing the learning that results. Very few students in the world have such complex technology at their fingertips, and just as we learn from those that have gone before us, we need to support others to improve their learning.

Globalteacher and Globalstudent have provided an outstanding platform to launch teachers and students on their cyber-journeys and it’s success is based on the global audience that blogging allows. Students need to learn the skills for cyber-safety and global student has proven to be an excellent way to achieve this goal. I hope that these opportunities to connect with a global audience are not replaced with test driving in a supermarket car-park.

Image Source – Creative Commons

The path followed by the Sun is called the ecliptic, and any constellation within the ecliptic is called a “zodiac constellation”. You may be familiar with these as the symbol of your ’star sign’ or horoscope identity. The word “zodiac” comes from Greek, meaning “circle of animals” and each of the twelve (except Libra, the scales) is represented by an animal. Year 8 Science students are required to search for an image of their zodiac sign and recreate the constellation using black paper and pin-holes. Use my Delicious links at right to start. If you have completed this task, you can search for your 2010 horoscope, and we will try to guess which prediction is true for each student in the class.

What is the difference between astrology and astronomy?

Have astrologers contributed to the science of astronomy?

Year 6/7 students will be creating a children’s story book to teach Mrs. Lee’s prep/1 class about Forces. You will use the on-line program “StoryJumper”, which allows you to add scenes, props, text and a cover to an on-line story book. Make sure your story includes one or more of the following forces: Gravity, Bouyancy, Friction, Surface tension, Magnetic forces, Muscular Forces, Static Electricity or Lift. Here are some examples of stories I have written and illustrated to demonstrate:

“Gravity and the Baby Bird” by Britt Gow

“Platypus Forces” by Britt Gow

You will need to sign up to “StoryJumper” and activate your account using your school email address. You can access your school email account at any time by going to webmail – make sure you have this link book-marked, so you can get to your email quickly and easily.

Unfortunately, I missed the most recent #scichat on Twitter about “Assessment in Science”, which included discussion about rubrics, portfolios, “open journal quizzes”, “performance labs.”, oral tests, addressing misconceptions and content vs process. Two of the comments that resonated with me were “shifting away from thinking of students as future scientists to students as future citizens” and “providing an authentic audience”.  This was a timely discussion, as we are finalising a curriculum document at our school at present, and I have been thinking carefully about why it is important to teach science in schools. This is what I have come up with:

As a science teacher I aim to:

1. Improve students levels of scientific literacy to enable:

• informed debate about scientific and technological issues that appear in the popular media
• active participation in decision-making policy on a range of scientific issues, including environmental matters (for example: stem-cell research, genetically modified organisms, climate change, immunization)
• consumer confidence based on rational, scientific thinking

2.  Encourage students to become enthusiastic about learning and about science (increase motivation)

3. Develop student’s confidence in their ability to achieve their goals (in science and more generally)

4. Foster an appreciation for the natural environment and the develop the knowledge and skills to contribute to a sustainable society

5. Develop students knowledge, skills and attitudes that are necessary to establish and maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Why do you think it is important to teach and learn about science? Please leave me a comment if you have any more ideas.

Image Source – adapted from Ryan Wick

This week the Year 8 Science class will submit their 60-second science videos to be entered into the national competition. Each of the videos submitted have been uploaded to TeacherTube and can be viewed by clicking on the links below. The next topic is Space – stars, comets and asteroids in our solar system.

Rachel and Kirsten’s “How to make a Rainbow” video

Luke’s “How does a  Wind Turbine Work?” Video

Jess’s video about “Oil Spills and Wildlife”

Josh and Cody’s “How a Star is Born” video

Georgia and Maddy’s “Phases of the Moon” video

 Year 6/7 students will complete their “Forces” project – a poster or video about the actions of forces. The best of these  videos have also been uploaded to TeacherTube and can be viewed by clicking on the links below. The next topic is Electricity. Students will learn what is important about electric circuits, how to make a switch and then construct a simple torch from basic materials (cardboard tube, wire, paperclips, globe, aluminium foil and tape.)

Aaron and Jim’s movie

James and Nick’s Forces Video

Nathan’s Pivot animation about Forces

James C.’s Forces movie with Pivot

Jayden’s Forces Video

Stephanie’s Forces movie

Elly’s Forces video

Emalee’s animal forces video

Shannon’s Forces video

Kiri’s Forces video

Since Monday’s state-wide, student-free professional development day, I have been pondering the what the future might hold for Victorian teachers and the Ultranet. According to some reports, six years and $88 million has been spent developing the on-line education platform that will allow 24hr access to lesson plans, timetables, student assessment data and attendance records.

 Some teachers have been using the tools that the ultranet purports to deliver for many years already – web2.0 tools, such as blogs, wikis, slideshows, interactive calenders and message boards are readily available on the internet. These ‘early adopters’ of technology in education have tested the tools, used them with students and made decisions about how they can be used to improve learning outcomes. Many of these teachers have become ‘lead users’ of the ultranet, trained to deliver professional development to their fellow staff members and be responsible for the uptake of the ultranet in their schools.

 It has been disappointing, to put it mildly, for these teachers that the ultranet was unavailable and running very slowly on the day that it was meant to showcase its benefits. As well as giving credence to the ‘blockers’, naysayers and critics, many of the hours spent preparing for the day have been wasted. Experienced teachers had plan B in place and the day was not a total loss, with the opportunity to introduce many other web2.0 tools to staff. Our staff were able to spend time exploring FUSE (Find, Use, Share, Educate), GradeXpert (assessment tracking tool), image, audio and video software as well as iPods and Google. Anne Mirtschin, our ICT expert at Hawkesdale and our beloved  guru of technlogy, has written a much more detailed account of our day, including preparation and post-op at “Are we there yet? The Ultranet.”

 When we first heard about the ultranet, four or five years ago, it’s premise was a ’safe’ learning environment for Victorian school children, a ‘walled garden’, where students could learn about communication, collaboration and connections without risks to their privacy and safety. Since then, our students have been involved in many global projects without any concerning incidents. They have learnt how to be ‘cyber-safe’ and the importance of the digital footprint they leave behind. They have been prepared for life outside school, when there is no wall keeping them in.

 Hence my pictures – the Porsche is what we’ve been using up to now – a smooth, fast and up-to-date vehicle for experienced drivers. A high-performance engine and easy to manouveur with your finger-tips, the Porshe is fast and flexible but risky to drive for inexperienced users. On the other side is grandma’s Volvo – solid, safe and practical. Good for learner drivers, the Volvo can be slow, clunky and difficult to turn. The Ultranet will give teachers who have not yet fully embraced web2.0 technology the opportunity to learn in a safe and secure (but slow and inflexible) environment. Hopefully, the owner and mechanics will keep the vehicle well maintained and up-to-date and it will transport many passengers , until they are ready to purchase their own high-performance vehicles!

Each student prepared a storyboard by folding a sheet of A3 paper into 6 sections and then drawing an example of the following results of forces:

• Forces can start motion
• Forces can stop motion
• Forces can change the speed of motion
• Forces can change the direction of motion
• Forces can change the shape of an object, and
• Forces can have no visible effect at all!

Now they are using various programs (Pivot, Photostory, Monkey Jam, Windows Movie Maker and Paint) to illustrate a short movie demonstrating each of these effects of forces. Some students prefer to draw with a real pencil and can take a photo of their drawings and add headings and speech bubbles with Comic Life – which is available on the computers in Room 2 or you can get a free, 30-day trial at Comic Life.

These videos show how you can convert Pivot (stick figure) animations to AVI files for YouTube and how to put a Pivot animation into Windows Movie Maker. You could also try this one. You will need to access these from home as YouTube is blocked at school.  Students, please make sure any digital images you use are in the public domain or Creative Commons (free to use with certain conditions) and that you list the sites you have referred to on the last slide of your video presentation.

Here is Nathan’s Forces Movie, made in Pivot, converted to WindowsMovieMaker and uploaded to YouTube.

Image Source

One of the first scientists I remember on television, apart from David Attenborough, was Professor Julius Sumner Miller, who had a weekly program on ABC called “Why is it so?”. He had the appearance of a stereo-typical ‘mad scientist’, with bushy eyebrows and wild, grey hair. But his passion for the subject matter – usually physics and chemistry – shone through!

This week, Year 8 students started a project to produce a 1 minute video that explains a science concept of their choice. The 60-second-science video competition is being run for the second year, with prize money up to $8,500. There are separate categories for primary and secondary schools, and prizes for students in each state and territory. The students in my class have chosen a range of topics and plan to produce videos using Windows MovieMaker, Monkey Jam and Photostory. First they will need to do some reseacrh about their topic and then produce a storyboard to show how they plan to film their project. They also need to write a script that clearly explains the concept they are trying to convey.

• Rachel and Kirsten – How a rainbow forms (How Stuff Works)
• Georgia and Maddy – Phases of the Moon (the moon wiki here)
• Jessica – How oil affects marine life (Aust. govt site)
• George and Harvey – Rabbit Control (Myxo and Calicivirus)
• Sean and Bailey – Potato Famine (BBC site)
• Grace and Taylor – Invasive species
• Ashley and Sam – Series and parallel circuits
• Josh and Cody – Lifecycle of a star (Think Quest)
• Luke – How does a wind turbine work? (How Stuff Works)

Students, please make sure any digital images you use are in the public domain or Creative Commons (free to use with certain conditions) and that you list the sites you have referred to on the last slide of your presentation.