This week in science class we made an eyeball from paper mache using water, newspaper, and glue. Currently, we are learning about the eye and vision. I have my students know the different parts of the eye and a general overview of how vision works. The vocabulary for this topic is the retina, rods, cones, lens, sclera, pupil, and Iris.
It’s a fun project that all students can do. First, we begin by blowing up a balloon to about the size of 10 or 15 cm in diameter. Then, rip thin strips of newspaper maybe one or 2 cm wide and 10 or 15 cm long. Dip the newspaper strips into the solution and wrap them around the balloon. The paper mache is made of water and glue. I have found in the past using this simple mixture makes great paper mache. It’s also easier to clean than using cornstarch or other powders.
By the second day, the students should have two or three coats of paper mache around their balloon. It’s best to have five or six coats of paper mache as this will give the eyeball strength. After the paper mache dries we paint the whole eyeball white, this represents the sclera. Next, they paint the iris color blue, green, brown, or turquoise in the classroom and the pupil is painted black. When this is done I test the students orally and by pointing out the different parts of the eye. I also asked them what are the part of the retina and what is their function. The two parts of the retina are the rods and cones. The rods detect lightness and darkness and the cones detect the color. Also, I ask why do we have a blind spot? The answer is that this is where the optic nerve is located.
This is a nice project for seventh grade science as it takes about three or four days to complete. The whole time they are making the eye, I am circulating around asking about the different parts and discussing how the eye works. The students enjoyed making it and they can take it home when they are done. Give it a try and let me know how it goes.
My new software arrived in the mail on the Friday before Christmas. I decided to buy MacSpeech Dictate because my typing skills are not that good and I read some good posts about the latest in speech recognition.
Last month, I read an article on Pro-blogger by Jon about how speech recognition software is much better now and about how well it is working for him. I decided to give it a try and I ordered MacSpeech Dictate from Amazon.
I have many ideas for Siyensya using pictures, video and the traditional written post. But my problem is that I never learned to type and I just can’t seem to improve my typing skills. The ideas and creative flashes come very fast and I can’t take advantage of them because by the time I start typing, I’ve lost the ideas and focus. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to type very fast and actually, I don’t want to because of the possibility of getting a repetitive wrist injury.
This is my first post using the program. After going through a short process of voice training, the program seems to be working very well. I am impressed. MacSpeech types out everything I say, ever if I speak fast. I can see that this will be a new skill for me to learn – speaking out loud while trying to think ahead.
My goal, is to have three posts per week and to build up my website with lots of good content. MacSpeech will help me with this goal.
This past week I had the opportunity to go inside a large plastic bag and have the air sucked out. Why would I do this? I did it because this demonstration was about air pressure. When the air is sucked out of the bag, one feels the combined air pressure of 14.7 psi. It is much stronger that you would think.
Some of the students also took turns going into the bag to experience the air pressure. It was quite an interesting day in science class.
My eighth grade classes launched their water rockets last month. I took video of the students and their rockets and now have it posted to our school’s website. I made an iMovie from all the video clips. I originally had it as a twenty minute video, but I edited it down to about four minutes so it didn’t take too long to upload and play. This is my first attempt at shooting the video, editing the clips and posting to the school’s server. Check it out.
The rockets are made with two, 2-liter bottles. The top bottle is where the astronaut egg is located. The goal is to keep the astronaut safe and secure by designing an enclosure around the egg so it doesn’t crack. All types of materials are used and must be accounted for in the final cost.
The bottom bottle is the engine. We fill the bottle about half full with water and I pump it up with about 60-70 pounds of pressure. I have a specially designed rocket launcher that keeps the rocket set until I pull the pin. The students work in groups of two and this project takes about a week to complete.
I bought the EyeClops video microscope last week and it arrived yesterday. I took it to school and my students had it up and running in no time. I was interested to see the quality of the images and video and to see if this would be something I could use in the classroom. The first thing to do is insert 5 AA batteries. It comes with a USB flash drive that records the media. I also tried a 2 gigabyte flash drive and it worked nicely. During the day I learned to move from pictures to video and how to focus. There are three magnifications: 100x 200x, and 400x. It’s difficult to focus when using the 400x but I learned to hold it down and go from lower power to higher.
The flash drive will only hold a few megabytes of data so have another flash drive handy. Here area few pictures I took today, my first day with the EyeClops. I hope to explore more this week and have an updated post by this weekend.
Here is a piece of bread at 100x. All of these pictures were imported into iPhoto and given a quick edit using the enhance magic wand.
The second picture is an onion skin at 200x.
The third picture is the same onion skin at 100x. The fourth picture is a closeup of a pineapple at 100x. The last is a small video of a state map.
After I took these pictures, it was easy to hook the EyeClops into the VCR using the S-video and project it onto the Smartboard for the whole class to see. I bought mine for $24.99 at Amazon and it is worth the price, even if you just play around with it. We had a fun day in science class today.
Any teacher will tell you that teaching is a demanding job and that it’s easy to get burned out. The key is to recognize the warning signs and to take action. Elaine Plybon over at Cruel Shoes has a good post dealing with this topic. This post caught my attention because I was just thinking about this and teachers now need to reflect and plan for the final stretch.
“How do we be sure we are not quietly heading toward burnout and completely inappropriate behaviors? Reflection.”
Yes, reflection. Reflect often and not only on what did I do and how could I do it better, but on how could I have done that will less stress. I always try to figure a way to do an activity with less stress. Usually, this is done by being very organized and visualizing in my mind what I will do before I start the class.
Elaine gives threes steps to help prevent burnout: take a break, change your thinking, and to never stop reflecting. These steps are a good way to help reduce the stress and to become a better teacher. Reflecting and thinking of what to do differently will help any teacher to reverse the trickle of negative behaviors.
One thing I would like to add that has helped me to become a better teacher is to reduce the amount of time when changing activities. I thought about this one day a long time ago when I was reflecting on what I could do to reduce the noise level when switching between activities and reduce the stress of changing gears during the day. What I do is on the first day of school, I give just one rule to know for the day. The rule is when I raise my hand the class should 1) stop talking and 2) raise your hand. This one rule has helped me every day to keep my stress levels low by being able to transition between activities during class. Now when the class is working, and we need to move on, I just raise my hand and instant quiet.
The first week of class, someone might test the water and see what happens if they don’t raise their hand. I usually add on a second mini rule so that the last person to raise their hand is the last one out of the classroom. Just keep it lighthearted and try not to be so serious. Give this a try and reduce your stress level.
Today I start the 31 day challenge given by ProBlogger on how to improve one’s blog. This will be quite the challenge for me as I work all day and I am tired when I arrive home. Still, I want to improve Siyensya and focus in on where I want this site to go.
The first challenge is to make an elevator pitch. What is an elevator pitch?
“An elevator pitch is an overview of an idea for a product, service, or project. The name reflects the fact that an elevator pitch can be delivered in the time span of an elevator ride (for example, thirty seconds or 100-150 words).” Wikipedia
This pitch is like a mission statement as it gives direction on where the site is heading. All decisions reflect back to this elevator pitch and and this gives the site purpose and direction. It is also short and to the point. I like that. Keep it simple.
This is a difficult challenge for me as I am not sure where to go with this site. I am interested in many subjects like math, science, gemelogy and teaching. But I am also interested in selling information and some of my artistic creations. I have some ideas now, but what I will do is sleep on it and first thing tomorrow morning I’ll post on my elevator pitch, aka mission statement.
update: Since my goal is to teach and/or tutor math, science and ESL from the Philippines using science as a base, my elevator pitch should reflect this. I like teaching and learning technology for an improved life. I’ll keep thinking.
update II: I thought about this during the day and I’ve feel good about this new update.
Science and Math For Life. I’m looking to incorporate and extend science and technology by using web communities to communicate with and to build and develop friendships.
Welcome to the new Siyensya using the Thesis theme. I was looking for something more polished and flexible and I have found it with this theme. Thesis requires WordPress 2.7 so I had to upgrade this past weekend. My web host uses Fantastico, but they are only up to WP 2.6.5. So last Sunday I did a manual upgrade and I am happy to say that everything went ok. I will be posting more now that I am happy with the new look.
Today, President-elect Barack Obama selected John Holdren and Jane Lubchenco as science advisers. Obama said “It’s time we once again put science at the top of our agenda and worked to restore America’s place as the world leader in science and technology.” Also joining Obama’s science team is Nobel Prize-winning scientist Harold Varmus and professor Eric Lander, a specialist in human genome research.
We are learning about air pressure and I thought a good idea would be to have the students experience what the pressure feels like. The students enjoy going in the “great garbage bag vacuum model of science” Here I am in the bag. Use a very large construction bag and insert a vacuum. The air will be sucked out and you will feel the pressure. Give it a try whent studying atmospheric pressure. You’ll have their attention for the whole unit.
This week in science class we made an eyeball from paper mache using water, newspaper, and glue. Currently, we are learning about the eye and vision. I have my students know the different parts of the eye and a general overview of how vision works. The vocabulary for this topic is the retina, rods, cones, lens, sclera, pupil, and Iris.
This past week I had the opportunity to go inside a large plastic bag and have the air sucked out. Why would I do this? I did it because this demonstration was about air pressure. When the air is sucked out of the bag, one feels the combined air pressure of 14.7 psi. It is much stronger that you would think.
My eighth grade classes launched their water rockets last month. I took video of the students and their rockets and now have it posted to our school’s website. I made an iMovie from all the video clips. I originally had it as a twenty minute video, but I edited it down to about four minutes so it didn’t take too long to upload and play. This is my first attempt at shooting the video, editing the clips and posting to the school’s server. 
Here is a piece of bread at 100x. All of these pictures were imported into iPhoto and given a quick edit using the enhance magic wand.
