Spiders - and their impact on my time IN education......

Because Jeannine found and gave me a super spider skeleton the other day, spiders have been on my mind. So, I thought it would be a good idea to put my spider experiences together for anyone who is interested. For long time readers of my blog, the first article, Tiger, you will already have read.............. 

ENJOY

Spiders – and their impact on education!!

Thank you, Tiger

I started teaching way back in the early 1960s. Well, teaching is perhaps too grand a word. It would be more honest to say that I began to be paid for standing daily in front of loads of bored adolescents, opening a well-thumbed science text book, and reading aloud. Then, scribbling science words on the blackboard to be copied into science notebooks.

13- year-old Tiger always sat alone at the back of my science lab. He did not sit politely through each lesson. Tiger was always looking for trouble. Sometimes he smiled benignly at the thirty-two other boys and girls, six of whom had recently emigrated from India and could speak but two words of English (‘lav, sir?’). Sometimes Tiger shouted, “S’boring, boring…….science is pissin’ scabby.” Sometimes, to prevent himself from falling asleep, he’d run his fingers through his greasy hair, scratch his head, and interfere with anyone sitting close to him working diligently through the science textbook.

My science lessons on Mosquitos and other insects didn’t interest Tiger. School didn’t interest him and science didn’t engage him. Nothing I did in my science lessons made any connection to Tiger’s life experience or appealed to his sense of curiosity. The science I read from the textbook was irrelevant to his world – especially the way I presented it. His Dad told him that he’d have a job with him as a bricklayer on the building sites when he was fifteen, so why should he ‘do his best’ in school? What was the point of it all?

In the first week of October, the miracle of miracles happened - a big change for the better came over my teaching. Tiger, of all people, and a small garden spider, were my divine inspirations.

Walking back from shopping at the Coop for the weekend food, I spotted the most beautiful spider sitting in her intricate silky web in the black currant bush outside the steps leading up to my flat. Surprised to see one so late in the year, I fetched a jar, popped the spider inside, and took her upstairs.

I took the spider to school the following Monday, put her in a large bell jar with a little soil, some greenery and a forked tree branch, I set the new home on a small table, away from direct light, at the back of my science lab.

The following day, I noticed a silk egg sac dangling from near the center of the spider’s orb web. Sensing the spider was hungry, I caught a small silverfish darting around the base of my desk, unscrewed the top of the spider home, and dropped the small creature on the web. Immediately, the spider came running towards her prey. I sat and watched, fascinated by the spider’s eating habit, until Tiger’s class came through the door, breaking the atmosphere by noisily throwing their satchels under their stools. They were ready for yet another particularly dull science lesson (all chalk and talk, then reading and writing, and no ‘hands-on’ science investigation). 

Before I even started, the kids looked bored. I got up quickly, pushing the spider home to one side.

As I walked towards the blackboard, Tiger came through the door. He looked upset. He stared at the floor, mumbling he’d been sent to Mr. Thomas’ office because, he said, “I was caught looking through a dirty book, sir. ‘Fore school started.” “T’ain’t fair.”

 “Who caught you?’ I asked. I wanted to know more about what had happened. Tiger’s tone changed, and he glared across the room at me, and shouted belligerently:

“Mr. Jelbert, you know, Mr. Paull, he looks at us lads through his telescope from the class upstairs. He saw me. Looking at pictures. You know. Dirty pictures. Naked girls and stuff. Weren’t my book, though, Mr. Paull. It’s Fatty’s, Fatty White’s. Now Mr. Thomas has it. Fatty’ll murder me. I’ve got to go back to the boss’s office after school. And I’ll get caned. I’ll get six, I know I will.”

I calmed him down as best I could. Tiger turned and went to his usual spot at the back of the lab. He looked sulky and angry.

I read a few lines about gases from the science book, closed it, and picked up the chalk. As I was writing on the blackboard, asking the kids to open up their journals and copy my notes, there was a loud shout of “CHRIST!” from the back of the room. Startled, every head turned to see what was going on. Tiger was standing up and pointing his index finger and thumb at the bell jar. 

His eyes now were wide open. ‘F*#     ‘ell! Look!’ “Mr. Paull, Mr.Paull, there’s a spider ‘ere! It’s killing a creepy-crawly! It’s f*^** killing it! Look!!!”

I raised my hand. ”Tiger, watch your language!”

” Mr. Paull, Mr. Paull, Can’t ‘elp it. I can’t f*ing believe it. Look at THAT! The spider, f*+** great!!” “Fz+** GREAT!!

I told him to sit down, leave the spider alone, and get out his science journal. I turned to the class, some standing near their seats, wanting to know what was going on. 
“Wassup wiv Tiger, Mr.Paull?” asked Michael. “’e sick or summat? HE swore. Used the F word, sir. Wot you goin’ to do?”

I tried to settle everyone down. 

“C’mon. Everybody. Thank you, Michael.  Never mind Tiger. He’s just having a moment. Get on with your writing. 
C’mon everybody, no big deal.”

The spider eating her lunch, of course, was, for Tiger, far more interesting than my science-reading lesson. Tiger swearing loudly was much more captivating than my science-reading lesson for the class. 

“Let’s see. I wanna see,” shouted David.

I gave in. “Go on, then, everyone, take a look.” “Go and see what’s in the jar – then get back to your seats.”

The class didn’t need telling twice. Everyone rushed to join Tiger at the back of the room. He pointed at the spider in the jar. “Look at that,” he shouted. “Bloody great!” 
The kids stared at the jar and started chattering excitedly about the spider – excited chatter was something I had never heard in one of my science lessons.

“Ain’t never seen a spider like that! What is it? Wos it doin’?” someone asked. 

One of the girls, Diane, said the spider was so beautiful. “Can I look at it, sir? Please? Can I get a maggy glass from the drawer?” she asked.

I thought for a moment. Why not? “‘Course. Go on. Get the tray of maggies.” Diane fetched the tray and chose a magnifying glass and held it close to the jar, peering at the spider. “It’s great, Can I draw it, sir? Please? 
Can I?” she asked.

 “Of course.” I answered,  “Use your pencil, not your pen. Oh, don’t, though, draw it in your science book. That’s for science. Here, there’s a piece of scrap-paper on my desk you can use.”

Dianne looked at me, and asked, drily, “Aren’t spiders science, Mr. Paull?”

“’Course, Dianne. Sorry.” I replied, kicking myself.  “Do it, drawing, oh, go on, put it in your science journal.”

The idea caught on and a few more girls also wanted to draw the spider, sitting in her web, clasping the poor silverfish. Tiger did not draw the spider in his journal. He sat very still, ignoring me and everyone else, watching the jar, mesmerized.

Tiger stayed behind after class, and, with a warm grin and an impish twinkle in his eye, said,  “The spider’s great, sir, ain’t it great? You like ‘em? Spiders? They’re brill!” 

He looked up at me. “Sorry I swore, sir, sorry. Won’t do it again. ‘Onest!! Don wanna draw, Mr. Paull. Can’t draw, you know. Scabby drawer.”

“Well,” I said, “I think you can draw, but your pictures are a bit rude, you know.” “Really rude.”

Tiger smiled and then said he was going to get some spiders of his own as soon as he got home.

“Good, but now get off to your next class. Don’t be late,” I said. “Oh, and don’t forget to see Mr. Thomas………….and be sure to give the book back to your friend.”

The next day, there was Tiger waiting for me, before school started, with that impish smile on his face. “Found ‘em, Mr. Paull, found ‘em.” Tiger had a jar in his satchel. “There were stacks of ‘em. Tiny ‘uns. Babs, I think, ain’t they? I got free or four. Can I keep them in the lab, Mr. Paull? Go on! Can I? Next to yours?” 

Then, he added: “Found out about ‘em, too, Mr. Paull. My dad knows what they are – they’re Garden Spiders, and they eat flies and stuff.”

 “You know what? You’re ok, Mr. Paull. Sorry, sorry, I swore.”

 “Thank you, Tiger, thank you. I appreciate that.” I said. “I’m sorry you swore, too.”

I gave him four jars, telling him that spiders can’t live together without paralyzing and eating each other. “Make a home for each one, ok?” “Quick, school’s starting soon.” OH, and you can tell your class what you know about spiders, ok?”

When his class came for science, Tiger stood by the blackboard,  looking sheepishly at the front of the room, and told a very respectful, quiet, surprised, and very attentive audience what he had learned about spiders. I was fascinated to see how Tiger caught everyone’s attention with his excited, twitchy, body movements. Tiger had at last discovered something in my science period that made him feel that wonderful, inside –your-head glow when the brain is alive and alert. His classmates felt it, too.

“Spiders, “ he said, “ are dead good.” “Look at this one. It’s a beaut.” He held up one of the jars.

 “Guess what I found out………….spiders suck their food after they’ve crushed and made it watery…….ain’t only the gals that make silk……..the fella spiders make silk, too, but only when they’re young………..then they stop and go looking for a spider girl-friend. They mate on the web………….sometimes the gals kill and eat the fellas. 

Some spiders chase after stuff they want to eat.”

He’d really done his homework. I was taken aback by how much Tiger knew, thinking: “Where did he learn that from, then? All from his dad? Well, I know for sure it weren’t from me in science lessons.” 

Tiger told his audience that, if anyone wanted to watch, he was going to release the spiders and their eggs in the school garden at lunchtime. 

“They’re goin’ to die soon, y’know, and the eggs will ‘atch, next year, spring, right, Mr. Paull?”

When he’d finished, everyone clapped. This was Tiger’s finest hour. “Any questions for Tiger?” I asked. The hands went up, and Tiger was asked a million questions, some of which he could answer. What a wonderful lesson about teaching and learning, I thought.

That night I checked my spider’s identity in a spider book, learning that it was Meta segmentata, a common garden species related to the garden spider. Its courtship routine was different, though. The male, I read, drives off other male suitors, but doesn’t advance towards the female until an insect is caught on the female’s web. Both spiders then move towards the struggling insect. 

The male’s front legs are larger than the female and he uses them to push the female away from the insect.

He then gift-wraps the prey. As the female tucks into her dinner, the male wraps silk around her legs and then mates with her.

The following day, I went to school early in the morning, an hour or so before the official start of the day, and went to the science storeroom. I gathered a box full of microscopes, racks of test tubes, flasks, and other scientific equipment.  I set them out in the science lab. I made the room look like, well, a science lab. Oh, and rearranged the stools so that the kids could sit in groups.

When Tiger’s class came through the door, the boys and girls looked at my displays of science equipment.

“Hey,” said one, “look….look at all this science stuff……..and hey, look, we ain’t sitting alone. He’s put us in groups.

Mornin’, sir, this stuff looks great. Can we touch it?”

Tiger showed me a picture he’d drawn at home of the beautiful orb-web spider. “Look, sir, Mr. Paull, see what I did. Can I glue it on the cover of my science journal, Mr. Paull?”

“Hey, Tiger, Tiger,” I said,  “you did it. You drew your spider. You can draw, see?” “And you can pretty good.”

Seeing Tiger operating like a young scientist, was a first-time experience in my classroom.

I had learned, by sheer luck, what motivated and engaged my most challenging pupil: observing and studying a small spider.

It was, in fact, an incredible teachable moment.

It was THE first ‘Come on, John Paull, be a REAL teacher. Be professional. Earn your pension.’ wake-up call.

Thank you, Tiger. Thank you.

You helped shape my teaching.

From that day on, I thought as much, if not more, about how to bring my pupils into my lessons, how to capture their curiosity, how to engage and motivate them.

Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t. But it certainly made me more interested in my teaching.

The story of 

Willie the Spidernaut

John Paull 1969


Background

In 1969, when working with David Hawkins at the Mountain View Center for Environmental Education, based at the University of Colorado in Boulder, I visited a number of elementary schools in Boulder School District. At the time of the impending first landing on the moon, I was spending at least one day a week in the first and second grade classroom at Lincoln School. The daily talk, of course,  was of the silver rocket taking men way, way up to the moon. 


The lunar mission fulfilled President John Kennedy's goal of reaching the moon by the end of the 1960s, which he had expressed during a speech given before a joint session of Congress on May 25, 1961: 

"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."


The kids were really excited. And so was I. After all, history was being made.....

The Apollo 11 mission was the first human spaceflight  to land on the moon. Launched on July 16, 1969, the rocket carried Mission Commander Neil Alden Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, and Lunar Module Pilot,  Edwin Eugene 'Buzz' Aldrin.  

On July 20, Armstrong and Aldrin became the first humans to land on the Moon, while Collins orbited above.

Jeannie and Patti put together a display of books and magazines about the flight.

This is what I wrote in my journal:

Benji and the spidernaut –  1969

  

Lincoln reminds me of the best of Leicestershire schools. Every time I visit the incredibly well resourced classroom, I see children engaged and working individually or in groups, alone or with a teacher. They are reading, writing, constructing with blocks, cooking, painting, exploring science or mathematical materials, watching small animals in a terrarium, making electrical circuits to light bulbs for a building made from a shoebox, making and flying paper airplanes  and kits – and much more.

The two teachers, Jeanne and Patti, think very carefully about the mechanics of running their classroom, just one part of a teacher’s job. They know their students, they trust and respect them and they expect them to learn. They build a true community in which everyone has a role to play.

Jeanne and Patti spend time together before and after school preparing the room for each and every day. They use junk materials creatively, feeding off the excitement that is generated when teachers and children work well together – in short, everything that makes all the hard organizational tasks worthwhile.

I come to observe, to learn and to interact with the kids and the teachers.

One afternoon when I was working with a group of kids, one of them spotted a spider walking across the carpet. I picked it up and held it safely in my hand.

The kids were fascinated. They came close to see the spider and asked a thousand questions. “What is it? Where does it live? Will it sting? Can we touch it?”  I put the spider into a clean jam jar and talked about making a ‘real’ home for it. As we looked at it clambering around the slippery jar, I asked out loud:


"What did it need? Where would it sleep? Did it need a friend? How and what does it drink?”

There was an old bookcase in the corridor that no one seemed to want, so, that evening, Patti, Jeanne and I took it apart. We took out the shelves, lined the inside with plastic sheeting, added soil, plants and a light, screwed a huge sheet of Perspex to the front, and, hey, there was the most beautiful spider home you can imagine.

Willie's new luxury home

When the kids came in the next day, they were SO excited.                                                  

The excitement grew when the spider, now named Willie, built her first web. The excitement became intense when she caught and ate her first fly.

Man on the Moon

 On July 16^th, the Apollo mission was launched and was televised live. We watched its launch in the classroom. The kids were totally engrossed.

A few days later (July 20^th) we sat, mesmorized, and watched the moon-landing. There was such excitement as the astronaut bounced around on the surface of the moon. The kids were absolutely spellbound.


Later, one student, 8 year old Benji, was so taken up with the landing on the moon that he constructed a large rocket from boxes, with perfectly fitting nosecone.

He was soon joined by another lad who wanted to build a Russian Rocket, hearing that the Russians, too, were thinking of launching a rocket to the moon (his family was from Russia, I believe).

Eventually, they decided to combine their talents and work together to build the BEST rocket that it was possible to make. I helped them gather cardboard boxes from around the school, gave them a couple of rolls of tape and left them alone to make their rocket.

When the rocket was close to being finished, the boys came to me and asked if they could launch fly a living creature in their rocket. We talked about it and then asked the class. Everyone agreed we should fly Willie, our classroom spider, providing that there was no possibility we would hurt her.

Another question, for me, in particular, was HOW could we fly a huge cardboard box rocket? Mmmmm.....


Robin Hood provided the answer. We would launch our rocket in the same way an arrow is launched from a bow.

Outside the classroom were two big trees growing closely together – we could launch our rocket by sitting it on a length of rubber suspended between the trees.

Willie the Spider needed preparing for her trip, so we read about the training program for astronauts, amending it for Willie. She successfully completed her training, and, with great care, she was carefully placed in her matchbox (lined with soft felt and a moth for dinner) container, placed in the nosecone, and was subsequently launched in the rocket at 4:00 p.m. on July 20th. 


A crowd of forty plus children cheered as the rocket took off, headed toward the late afternoon sun.  The rocket 'flew' to a height of, say, two feet, tumbled, and fell to the ground. 

The crowd applauded, then went quiet. “Willie!! Where's Willie?“ they shouted.  

Benji ran to the fallen rocket, took off the nosecone and removed the matchbox,


Willie was alive! The crowd went wild.

After the rescue, Willie the Orb Spider, and, for a few seconds, Willie the Astrospider, was retired to the huge (and very appropriately designed) spider home in the back of the classroom.

Then the children gathered around in a circle on the carpet, and we wrote Willie’s story on a large sheet of paper to hang on the wall.

The Poster

We knew where to get a spider to send up in our rocket. 

We found the spider and we named him Willie. 

We put him through lots of tests, seeing how much roughness he could   take, the heat test, and the falling test. 

Willie passed all the tests and he we sent him up in the rocket. It tumbled in the air and fell down.

And he was alive. 

Willie then went back in his big spider home and lived a long time.

The following day, I helped Benji write to NASA. He described his rocket launching experience and asked:

Dear Nasa and dear Astronauts,   

We launched a spider into space. 

WHY don't you launch a spider into space?  We did!!  

We can show you how to do it!!  

Love, Benji.

Lincoln Elementary School

Disappointingly, we never got a reply.




To keep the momentum going in the classroom, I did  some research, discovering that:

•  Fruit flies were first sent into space in 1947, aboard a V2 rocket launched by the US to explore the effects of radiation exposure at high altitudes

•  Albert I, a rhesus monkey, became the first primate in space in 1948 but, sadly, he died of suffocation. Albert II, launched the following year, died on his return journey to Earth.

•  A stray mongrel dog from Moscow called Laika became the first dog to go into orbit in 1957 but died a few days into her mission

•  France launched a stray black and white tomcat into space in 1963. Felix, the first cat in space, had electrodes fitted in his head to measure neural impulses. I’m glad to say that he returned safely

•  Another satellite launched by the US in 1970 carried two bullfrogs. They were kept in a water-filled centrifuge to test the effect of gravitational fields on them and the inner ear's balance mechanism. They were never recovered.

A year later, when I went back to England, I celebrated the launching of Willie the spider, flying another in a hot air balloon, over the top of a school I was visiting. 


 Later, in 1973, I read that Anita and Arabella, two female cross spiders were launched into orbit destined for the Skylab 3 space station. They were used in experiments that evaluated their web building skills in near zero gravity among others things. They died before completing their tasks.

And, more recently (November, 2008) another space mission carried another spider in space. Like all astronauts, the two spiders aboard space shuttle mission STS-126 went through a rigorous selection process, fitness tests and hours of training to prepare them for their scheduled launch tonight. Joining a human crew of seven, the orb-weaver spiders were strapped into a special compartment aboard the shuttle Endeavour when it blasted off from Cape Canaveral in Florida. Their destination was the International Space Station, where they remained for the next three months, circling Earth more than 1,300 times at 17,500mph..

The spiders were one of two educational experiments designed by The University of Colorado-Boulder's BioServe Space Technologies that flew on Endeavour's mission.

The purpose of the spider experiment was to compare the web spinning and feeding of spiders in space with that of spiders on the ground. Over a dozen Colorado middle schools monitored the progress of the experiments through the videos, data, and images sent back from the ISS.


While the astronauts set to work on expanding the space station and plumbing in a new system that will allow future crews to recycle urine as drinking water, the spiders were busy dealing with the issues of near zero gravit. They eventually worked out how to make a perfect orb web and caught the fruit flies that had emerged from the larvae placed in the dog food at the bottom of their special home.

The Story of Sophie - Jeannine

Jeannine, currently a 5th grade teacher, reads the Tuesday Science section of the New York Times with her students first thing every Tuesday morning. She knows how and what to read from its contents and how to raise discussion and activity about its contents.

‘Everyone knows that the best times in teaching have always been the consequences of some little accident that happened to direct attention in some new way, to revitalize an old interest which has died out or to create a brand new interest that you hadn’t had any notion about how to introduce.

Suddenly, there it is.  The bird flies in the window and that’s the miracle you needed…’ [1]

In my first year of teaching in a public school, half of my multi-age first/second grade class (26 students in total) children had already spent one year together. I replaced a teacher who had left in the early spring on maternity leave.

The school year had been interspersed with stints with long term substitutes and was punctuated by disorder.  The school building was being renovated and the classroom had been moved to the basement level. The windows were covered with plywood until only two days before the school year began.  There were boxes, bookshelves, desks, and all signs of classroom life covered under a tarp in the middle of the room.  Inside, I found mishmashes of supplies, crayons, books, and math materials, obviously packed by students.

                 

In my class, there was a large group of challenging, bright, disengaged boys, one child with special needs who had a full time paraprofessional, and half a dozen students performing well below grade level.  The first month of school was hard.  There seemed to be little to hold the children together as a community, and I seemed to spend much of my time trying to figure out curriculum that was new to me.  

There seemed even less time to reflect on what was working well with my students or how I might make each day more interesting…

Then, along came a spider……………………

I found a large house spider on my basement steps and took her to school the following morning.

At our morning meeting, I showed my students the little creature that was soon named “Sophie,” after a character in one of our favorite books.  We built a habitat for her, caught and fed her small insects, and thus began a journey of learning about spiders that would change my classroom forever.

Sophie lived in our classroom for several weeks.  During that time, she spun a beautiful an intricate web, and suspended an egg sac.  The children checked on her daily, read about spiders, drew spiders, and wrote books about spiders.  

Early in November, Sophie died, as spiders do as the winter approaches.  But weeks later, her home was filled with dozens of spiderlings.  

Sophie’s life cycle was complete, and her magic new again in our classroom.  

Since that time, seashells, petrified wood, bark beetle twigs, wishing rocks, arrowheads, caterpillars, sea lion whiskers, wishbones, lightning stones, and ammonites have enriched and enlivened the morning meeting ritual.  

One morning, a black widow entranced us all!  Such things inspire my students to think more deeply about science and the natural world in which we live.  Natural curiosity about these things is followed by the desire to know more.

In the fall, a science journaling project encouraged the children to document, through word and picture, their own interests in the natural world.  Their experiments constantly amazed me—especially the level of thinking that went into the observations—from noticing the upside down reflection in a spoon to finding out that a boat can carry a heavier load if floating on salt water.  There was no end to the discoveries made and the excited chatter that always followed…

Email to John Paull - Subject: spiders and stuff!

Well, my classroom is 'abuzz' this morning with excitement about Sophie, the spider, and her web, and what appears to be an egg sac... And now, I know you're right, John...this is the 'real' stuff, the stuff that excites kids (and teachers, for that matter). I'm learning as much as they are--but the part I love is that the kids want to know more...and they're excited. And the kids who thought Sophie was 'scary' yesterday are now fascinated along with the rest of us. Life science is an amazing thing for all of us to watch up close--what a buzz there is in here today!

And another email, some time later……

Sad news this morning...Sophie is dying. She began to spin a new web during the night (her weight was pulling the other one down!). And this morning, she is lying at the bottom on a rock—legs still moving, but she's done for, I think...the kids are very sad...but you were right, it is that dying time for them, isn't it?  And judging from her size, she's been around a while...the end of an exciting era in our classroom...

And then another……..

You cannot imagine the excitement in my classroom this afternoon when we discovered the emergence of 40-odd spiderlings from Sophie's egg sac. I had, only this morning, added water to the habitat and wondered to myself when or if we might actually see the baby spiders appear. The discovery was made when the students were lining up to go home, and it caused quite a commotion!  What a great opportunity it has been for the students to observe the life cycle in full circle - with Sophie dying a little more than a week ago, and now seeing her babies hatch in the now empty little habitat that sits on my desk.....the kids were in absolute amazement, as was I......

Four years later…….

My classroom had become a place where children were engaged in the study of science in real world contexts.  The science table was always covered with things that children brought to school and were curious about….rocks, seashells, petrified wood, seeds and leaves, twigs etched with bark beetle tracks, dead insects in cups, bones collected on hikes, experiments with water, chemistry, and air pressure, and once a sea lion whisker…

Typically an elementary classroom Workshop: Science!!  session in my classroom begins with

·       About fifteen minutes that focuses on describing the session’s focus (telling a story, recounting an experience) and highlighting a skill the students will need in the session's investigations (say, modeling how scientists write in a journal) or a previously taught skill that needs revisiting.

·       How to get help from other students, library books, Internet, teachers, and, importantly, where the resources are stored - and how to clean up.

·       Showing how to use scientific apparatus, such as the hand lens, a balance, a timer.

Next a period (whatever when students work independently or in small groups. When appropriate, students make entries in their Scientist's Journals as they explore and investigate. During this time, the teacher supports and prompts each student by listening, questioning, and offering resources. Finally, students come together again for a Scientists' Meeting and present before the community of scientists (classmates).

Ideas come thick and fast. Sometimes from me. Sometimes from my kids.

Sometimes because we find a spider’s egg sac in a quiet corner of the classroom.

What follows offers opportunities for each student to ‘be a scientist’, and to make sense of natural phenomena; develop knowledge and understanding of scientific ideas, processes and skills; and learn about researching and communicating ideas.

Science inquiry  is the one curriculum area most directly related to improving mathematical, literacy, and team-playing skills.

And students like it!!

One of our classroom rituals (and perhaps one of the more sacred…) is reading The New York Times Science Times section each and every Tuesday of the school year.  We always find an article relevant to our current interests or topics of discussion.

One Tuesday in early fall, I read an article to the class about Pluto and the demotion of Pluto’s planet status.  The children were immediately curious about how Pluto had become a planet in the first place.  That question led us to a book called The Kid Who Named Pluto and Stories of Other Extraordinary Young People in Science ( McCutcheon, 2004).  In this book, we discovered the name Venetia Burney, an eleven year old from Oxford, England, who in 1930, suggested the name Pluto for Planet X, discovered at Arizona’s Lowell Observatory.  Venetia chose the name Pluto, because of her interest in mythology.  Pluto was the Greek god of the dark and distant underworld and the brother of Jupiter and Neptune.

The questions that instantly followed were, of course, when you’re working with six, seven and eight year olds is…”Is she still alive?....How old is she?...Where does she live?...Did she grow up to be a scientist?”  We went to the internet and searched Venetia Burney.  Up came an article on BBC News on line The Girl Who Named a Planet, (Rincon, 2006).  It gave a detailed account of the conversation on the morning of March 14, 1930 around Venetia’s breakfast table that led to the naming of the planet.  We also learned that Venetia (now Phair) had grown up to be a teacher and lived in Epsom, Surrey, England.

With that information in hand, the children then wanted to write to Ms. Phair.  We discussed the idea of a letter---but soon, our thoughts turned to writing about all the things that the children wondered about in Science.  It would have to be a book….something we had also become quite expert at in our classroom.  Over the next two weeks, the children wrote and illustrated Our Book of Big Questions that chronicled the biggest of the big questions…”What was before anything?...even before the earth…even before the dinosaurs? (Anika).  “I wonder how the whole universe was made?” (Pepijn).  “How did land form?” (Bryce).

On September 20, we carefully wrapped the book up (after making a second copy to keep in our classroom), sent the book off to a general delivery address in England, and collectively, held our breaths.

  

[1] David Hawkins’ book, The Informed Vision, [1] contains lectures/talks he gave in the 1960’s and 1970’s when Open Education was the flavor of the day. Public and private schools throughout the US were adopting the British Infant School style of laying enforced curriculum to one side, and, instead, making the curriculum fit the needs of the students in the classrooms.