Day 1
Science Friday's with Ira Flatow

Ira is no Bob McDonald, but I'm biased.   In all fairness, I have listened to Quirk and Quarks for many years and I haven't even heard of Science Friday's till Ira spoke as the Keynote speaker at the NAAEE conference in Ottawa.  Yet, the number of Canadian's at this conference appears to be about 10%, however, 35 million verses 317 million is 11%, so perhaps I shouldn't feel like 'why aren't more Canadians here telling our stories?'

Ira does have a passion for telling stories that are very much influenced by his own interest in science, and the important role it plays.  He did however in a very American way show how the media - TV, is now starting to use the 'idea' of science as sexy, and I suppose we are supposed to be happy about this. It sells. A woman at the end of his talk asked him to change the image of women portrayed in his presentation, in the name of gender equality.

Perhaps the only way we are going to live sustainably is to sell it.  Is that really the reality of today?  Idealism and optimism may disrupt the current state of consumption, but will there be enough time to heal our planet?

I was really excited about Ira's, observe everything project, that gets students to just observe, reminds me of the hermeneutic argument between the social sciences vs the natural sciences methodology.  The opportunity for making learning visible, jumps out at me.  An audience member observed how he was using both Climate Change and Global warming and he replied that he now prefers to use Global warming that is causing climate change, her recommendation was to call it Climate Chaos.  

 Ira showed us the cover to Kristin Ohlson's book "The Soil Will Save Us: How Scientists, Farmers, and Foodies Are Healing the Soil to Save the Planet".  So, I immediately wondered how many  english teachers would shed the Shakespearean texts for something that might  make a difference?  

Currently, the Alberta Government is in the process of re-desiging the curriculum and Kristin's book is an example to me of how the mechanism that is part of the problem won't be where we find the solution.  Why don't we let a student who would is interested in this story and its cause, be the journey of learning for that student?  Freeman Tilden, one of the founders of Interpretation, wrote seven principals for communicating and teaching learners about our world.  One of the principals, states that what ever you are teaching it must be relevant to the learner.  

Ira reinforces the notion that we are currently at a critical moment in time where we have the opportunity to change.  

So lets change; stop consuming stuff that ends up in landfills,  stop consuming food that isn't food or local (just read Pollan's "Food Rules"), stop making human made compounds (~215,000) that don't exist in nature and/or kills cells, stop polluting our water, air, soil.  How about just stop, take the time heal and then the world might stop hating, and the $500 billion dollars that one country spends on military could be spent on healing the planet.  

I know, I know, I can hear more criticism of my own words, than compliance.  Idealism and optimism get the better of me.  Change inherited through time is evolution, and if any species plans on surviving they are constantly adapting and changing, and if we don't change then we will just be repeating the same mistakes that earlier cultures made, and the thinkers that believed phylogeny recapitulates ontogeny.

 WE (7.1 billion) can change.


http://www.cbc.ca/quirks/

http://www.sciencefriday.com