Module VII

Explain:

This module gave me some perspective on how climate change affects people in rural Alaska and how they might interact with western scientists studying climate change.  Elders can teach teens traditional knowledge about plants, and western scientists can teach them how to monitor the health of the plant populations.  However, it's not like the elders haven't already been monitoring populations.  They've just been doing it differently.  They've been in a given area much longer than the researchers so they have information about climate patterns over many seasons.  As a teenager in one of the TD videos said, the arctic is their home, not just a site for field studies.

Something else from this module that intrigued me was the information about the big bang.  I had no idea that we could detect remnant microwaves from this event.  The fact that we have this piece of visible evidence for something that happened so long ago is pretty amazing.

I was curious to learn what other cultures might believe about how the universe was created, so I looked up some creation stories from different countries.  My favorite was one from China where a being called P'an Ku hatches from a cosmic egg and different parts of his body form different parts of our universe.  For example, his limbs become the mountains, and his two eyes become the sun and the moon.  And guess what part of his body becomes mankind?  His parasites!

Painting of P'an Ku from Google Images

Extend:

This week I used one of the resources from the module right away.  Since we are studying the periodic table, I showed the TD videos about the origins of the elements.  It was a little over the heads of some of my 7th graders, but many of them thought it was pretty neat to think about how they "came from a star".

Soon I plan on also using the video showing how a person's infrared image disappears when a tube of CO2 is put between him and the camera.  That was a great visual to show how CO2 absorbs heat.  I think I will fit this in when we talk about the electromagnetic spectrum.

Evaluate:

"What you burn in your car today shows up in Antarctica by next year."  What if we took this statement from from the module and replaced the word Antarctica with the word Alaska?  Would it still be accurate?  I think so.  All of the climate change information is so very relevant to us in Alaska.  Alaskans will be disproportionately affected by climate change in the future, especially those in rural Alaska. 

I was excited that La’ona DeWilde is using her mapping knowledge in her job to develop citizen scientists in the villages.  She seems like a great role model.  Now there will be databases for things like water quality monitoring where there previously was no data.  This is what we need more of everywhere, not just villages, and with kids as well as adults.  When kids participate in projects such as this, they see themselves as scientists and help break down the stereotype of a scientist being an old crazy-haired white guy in a lab coat holding a test tube.  By the way, if you live in southcentral and interior Alaska you can get involved in a citizen scientist program involving the wood frog.

Wood frog from ADFG website

Other Blogs I Commented On:

Dave shared an experiment he is doing with his 6th graders involving pH, phytoplankton, and microscopic animals in ocean water.
Doug shared the observations of elders in Tuluksak who commented on the rising winter temperatures over the years.
Kathy suggested the book The Whale and the Supercomputer, which seems like it will be a great read.  I just picked it up.