Oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico on April 25th, 2010. Image from NASA.
The scale of the disaster caused by the oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico from the damaged oil rig is increasing day by day. We are preparing to go on the end-of-year adventure trip soon, but I’m wondering if students might be interested in heading down to the Gulf coast to volunteer in the clean-up.
NASA’s Earth Observatory has some amazing imagery on its page on the oil leak. Many of the images also show the mouth of the Mississippi and its delta, which tie directly into our observations in the sandbox. The impact of the oil spill also brings up the topic of density differences in fluids, something we’ve seen in the making bread jars, but applied to a much larger scale.
Hope dares to blossom
Even inside the abysmal abyss.
Hope secretly feeds
And strengthens
Promise.
– Sri Chinmoy
Poetry in the mornings right at the end of community meetings are going well. We’re into our third round and we’re beginning to get some original poetry. Some students are also asking to do more poetry in Language Arts. We’ve also discovered Short Poems.org but, although I have not set a minimum word limit, we’ve established a good precedent for how short a poem can be and the group is policing itself quite nicely.
Science is, at its core, hypothesis testing. To learn science learn the scientific method: figure out the precise question to solve (as best you can); come up with an answer you think might work (hypothesis); test it; and repeat as necessary while modifying the hypothesis. Almost all science experiments for middle school through college involve following a set of instructions in the lab manual. Only in independent research projects do students actually go through the scientific process and then it’s difficult because they don’t have the experience.
Part of the problem is that it takes time. Time to muddle through the though process of trying to figure out what exactly is a tractable question to solve. Time to come up to with a reasonable, testable hypothesis. Time to figure out how to test it. Time for iterating through the process again, although, once you’ve set up your experiment the first time doing it again and again is not that hard or time-consuming.
With our Montessori Middle School’s six-week cycle of work, and even with the two weeks dedicated to the Natural World, students should be possible to get through this process for at least one problem. They would probably have to dedicate the two weeks to a single problem/experiment and it would probably be terribly slow in the beginning.
To discover the truth about nature, Ibn a-Haitham reasoned, one had to eliminate human opinion and allow the universe to speak for itself through physical experiments. “The seeker after truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and, following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them,” the first scientist wrote, “but rather the one who suspects his faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits to argument and demonstration.” – Steffens (2008) (Ibn Al-Haytham: First Scientist)
Tammy Carter Bronson, author and illustrator of Tiny Snail, and Matthew Bronson, author of The Kaleidonotes, gave an excellent talk about publishing and the heroic journey to our middle and elementary classes. We use the heroic journey as a story arc a lot, but it was great for the students to hear published authors talking about how important it was to them.
The Bronsons have done over 500 talks to schools (but this was their first to in a Montessori program) so they have a well polished presentation. I particularly liked how they stressed the need for revision when writing. Tiny Snail took nine months to write, and 16 revisions before Ms. Bronson was happy enough with it to start illustrating. And it’s a kids picture book. They talked about peer reading and read-out-loud revision strategies. In our after-talk discussion, while we assembled a couple graphic organizers on the heroic journey and publishing, it was great to see the students recognize, however reluctantly, that there might actually have been a good reason for them practicing these techniques all year.
It was also very interesting to hear that the authors are delving into the growing opportunities of the web for building a following and publishing their work. You can find Ms. Bronson reading Tiny Snail and Pollywog on their YouTube channel. While it’s not up yet, I’m really looking forward to seeing the making of her new book, where she is video recording the entire process.
This was a great opportunity for our students, especially the prospective writers and directors, and I will try to plan something like this every couple years. I also feel a little guilty. The Bronsons emphasize how important it is to put your best work forward. Even though it’s easy to self-publish or publish online what you put up will shape your reputation. That’s why multiple revisions are important. Yet despite my best efforts, I don’t have the time to revise each blog post until I’m completely happy with it. Blogging is a different beast. So I beg the reader’s lenience (of course, since the average number of readers per blog is one, this may not even be a problem).
Second fissure, viewed from the north, on 2 April 2010 (from Wikipedia)
Current events often generate the teachable moments we’re always seeking in order to strike students’ imagination. The eruption of Eyjafjallajökull is a prime example. I’ve already used it to point out the intersection of geothermal energy and plate tectonics, but there is so much more.
The second eruption in Eyjafjallajökull. Seen from Fljótshlíð on 20 April 2010 (from Wikipedia).
Eyjafjallajökull has been a wonderful subject for the art of photography. The image above is a great example but the time-lapse photos have been excellent. The photo to the right captures not just the stars streaking across the sky with a three minute exposure but the fiery red arcs of the volcanic ejecta.
The MODIS instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite captured an ash plume from Eyjafjallajökull Volcano over the North Atlantic at 13:20 UTC on 17 April 2010 (from NASA via Wikipedia).
One of the major benefits of the space program so far has been its Earth observing satellites. There is so much going on in the image to the left that it’s hard to know where to start. Why are there all those clouds over Iceland? (warmer land mass creates convection); what’s with the two plumes from the volcano, one concentrated high level and one disperse low level plume; fjords on the upwind side of the island and the straightened coastline on the lee; greenish plumes of glacier-ground, rock flour discharging into the ocean.
Dust particles suspended in the atmosphere scatter light from the setting sun, generating 'volcanic lavenders' like this one over the flight path of Leeds-Bradford Airport in England during the aviation shutdown. (from Wikipedia).
The dinosaurs were done in either by an asteroid impact in the Yucatan or the eruption of the massive flood volcanoes in Deccan, India, or quite probably both. Both of these events launched an enormous amount of ash, gas and fine particles into the upper atmosphere, blocking sunlight, causing global cooling. Well the ash from Eyjafjallajökull and the sulfur dioxide gas may be having a similar effect on Europe, and if there’s enough of it, on the world. The 1992 eruption of Mt. Pinatubo cooled the globe by about half a degree Celsius.
Sarah Baird, from the Sea Pines Montessori Academy‘s Middle School, has recently started posting articles on K-12 education at Savannah K-12 Examiner. Dr. Baird was a research scientist (chemistry) before getting into Montessori so she’s not afraid to delve into the scientific literature to support her articles, yet her writing is targeted to a general audience.
“I am doing it to write (because I love it) and educate teachers and parents outside Montessori about our philosophy…. I feel like Montessorians keep all the info to themselves. We need to share and be proud to even have a little positive impact on our public schools,” Sarah Baird (2010) personal communication.
Having been blogging here for a few months I can say I greatly appreciate this sentiment, especially since one of the things I’ve been most impressed about with the Montessori approach is how it encapsulates so much of the modern pedagogy about constructivist education.
Score one for adding another intelligent voice with a Montessori perspective to the web.
Hydrogen is an alternative source of fuel (alternative to fossil fuels), but it can be produced from renewable or non-renewable sources. PBS and Scientific American Frontiers have a nice video on hydrogen fuel. They first visit a lab producing hydrogen fuel cells. The second part of the program visits Iceland is trying to use geothermal energy to create the hydrogen. They also discuss producing hydrogen from solar-electric and algae.
Major tectonic plates (from USGS).Seafloor topography around the Hawaiian Hotspot (from NOAA)
The question came up about where are good places for geothermal energy, and the answer, of course, was to introduce plate tectonics. It was a quick introduction, and a refresher for the 8th graders, but the interest was there and it seemed impactful.
It also provided a link to talk about the Icelandic volcano that’s been disrupting air traffic in Europe. NASA has an amazing picture of the eruption on its Picture of the Day for April 19th.
Google Maps is a great tool for showing features like the mid-ocean ridges (use the satellite view), zooming in and out of the mountain ranges, tracing the Hawaii hotspot and watching East Africa split apart.
