Scientific Me

      Science and I haven’t always gotten along. We started out just fine; in elementary school, I loved science. I would always volunteer to participate in the annual science fair at my school, and would spend a lot of my own time at home doing the work for it. I didn’t really think of it as work though, because to me, I was just having fun learning about my environment and world. In third grade, I remember doing the classic salt and ice cube experiment for my project. I was fascinated to find out that salt actually lowers the freezing point of water, and I was so excited to share it with the judges at the fair. I vividly remember presenting my findings to the judges, explaining everything perfectly, and receiving a lot of positive feedback. I was so sure that I was going to get first place, and I remember being so upset when I didn’t even get an honorable mention. This experience stuck with me because it was this day where I think I started to become less and less interested in science. I (ridiculously) saw myself as a failure for not placing in the science fair that year, and I never participated in it again after that.

My excitement and passion for science picked up again in seventh grade, when on the first day of school, my teacher told us that we were going to be dissecting a bunch of animals that year. Seventh grade me was so excited to get the chance to do that. But, as the year went on, we didn’t dissect a single thing. I was upset and felt a little lied to, but that changed when on some day in the spring, my teacher told us it was time to dissect! I couldn’t have been more excited as I wondered what we would get the chance to dissect. My excitement quickly turned into disappointment though, as I realized all we would get the chance to dissect that day was a pickle. We cut it in half, took out its seeds, then stitched it back together. It was probably the most boring, unexciting dissection you could possibly do. After that day, we never got to dissect anything else, and it made me mad. After all of these promises, all I got to dissect was a pickle? I think this led me to be not so enthusiastic about science for the rest of my school career. It also didn’t help that from that year, all the way through my senior year of high school, I hardly did any experiments in my Science classes. We would just take notes, watch videos, and prepare for the regents exam at the end of the year. This caused me to end my high school career with somewhat of a disdain for science, which is something I still somewhat have today.

After reflecting upon these past experiences, I found a few patterns that probably caused me to feel the way I feel about science today. When I was excited about science, it was usually because I was doing a bunch of experiments. I don’t learn too well just reading textbooks and taking notes, so when the last six years of my science career consisted of solely that, I struggled and didn’t enjoy the subject at all.  In grades kindergarten through third, pretty much all we did for science was cool experiments. This is why I loved it so much, and why I always wanted to participate in science fairs and things of the sort. I loved discovering things though experiments, as you could actually see what was happening, rather than just reading about it. I also liked the sense of accomplishment that came with conducting and seeing the results of my own experiment. I feel as though a lot of students feel the same way as I do. Science isn’t a subject meant to be taught through textbooks; it’s meant to be taught through experiments and exploring.

Another reason I think I didn’t enjoy science was that I didn’t think I was good at it. After I didn’t get the recognition I (selfishly) thought I deserved from my third grade science fair, I got turned off from the subject. I didn’t think of myself as a scientist after that point, and I carried that negative attitude around with me for the rest of my schooling. I never took any science classes as electives in high school, even though I had plenty of opportunities to do so. I didn’t even think twice about it, which tells you all you need to know about my attitude at that time. I didn’t see myself as successful in the subject. Looking back now though, I really wish I didn’t have that attitude. Science is a fun and engaging subject, and I wish I gave it more of a chance in the past. To me, science is the study of our world, and how everything in it works. With this definition, I can definitely see why students would be excited to learn about the subject, even though I haven’t gotten too excited about it in the past. I hope that I rediscover my love for science through teaching it, and I really think I will! When I’m teaching science to my future students, I’m going to keep it fun and engaging, so that they don’t up with the same negative attitude about science that I had.

Climate Change and the Classroom

                                                                       
  

     Today, I had the privilege of getting to hear a lecture from Dr. Michael Edelstein from Ramapo College in New Jersey on climate change. It was engaging and informative, but also a little startling. Climate change is real, and we're starting to really see its effects. Temperatures are hitting record highs, sea levels are rapidly rising, and we're running out of fossil fuels. What does this mean for my generation? And more importantly, what does this mean for the future of our planet?

     The first thing that Dr. Edelstein discussed with us was that the science surrounding climate change is convergent, meaning that everyone agrees. However, if you turn on the news, or even read about it online, you'll find plenty of "experts" trying to debunk climate change as a real and immediate issue to our planet. These people are put out in the media by oil companies like Exon to try and disprove climate change and keep making themselves money. However, these "experts" can't do anything about the cold, hard truth that our atmosphere is at 405 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide. The big issue with this is that there is a ton of evidence supporting the theory that once our planet's atmosphere exceeds 350 ppm, there will be irreversible damage. We're way past that point now, which should definitely scare the climate change naysayers into rethinking their position.  We're just now really starting to see the effects of our damage to Earth, and the question remains; what can we do to keep our planet habitable for generations to come?

     That question has no easy answer, and the sad truth is that it may be too late to really ensure that Earth stays habitable for upcoming generations. However, that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. We all need to do our part to help our planet survive and thrive. This can be something as simple as buying a reusable water bottle instead of using bottled water, or using a hand dryer instead of paper towels. It can also be something as simple as carpooling more, to lessen the impact the car exhaust has on the atmosphere. You can also go as far as to use renewable energy like solar panels for your home. This creates clean, renewable energy that will never run out (at least to the best of our knowledge) and will not harm the environment. As a future teacher, I will do my part in my classroom to keep our planet clean and habitable for generations to come. I will educate my class on climate change through experiments, so they can really see what is happening to our planet with their eyes. As a teacher, the easiest way for me to help our planet is to educate my students on this issue and help create a generation of students who care for our planet.