Teachable Moments In Science: Kiera Wilmot

​Photo via WikiMedia

Science is fun! Part of the fun is failing, failing again, and pushing a hypothesis forward or rejecting it based off of evidence. This involves a ton of mistakes - some of which are more dangerous than others.  We need to learn how to turn reasonable mistakes into teachable moments.

16 year old Kiera Wilmot of Bartow High School mixed toilet bowl cleaner and aluminum foil on school grounds without supervision, resulting in a small non-harmful explosion. She was expelled for violating the school code of conduct, and faces felony charges of "possession/discharge of a weapon on school grounds and discharging a destructive device." The gory details, including the full police report, are located on the Miami New Times website.

​Kiera Wilmot, via Miami New Times

The real problem is with the school and the police. When a kid makes a mistake that's not severe, it can be easily turned into a teachable moment. How about suspension instead of expulsion, with the requirement of a lab assignment based on the very experiment that was tried by Kiera? How about requiring a presentation by her to the class and/or principal to show mastery of the subject? This solution combines a reasonable punishment with additional academic work to help Kiera learn the proper way to conduct experiments. It also gives the adults involved another way to gauge her understanding of the scientific method. The penalties should go up for repeated offenses, up to and including expulsion. 

​For more about how scientific curiosity helps us all win, check out my post Curiosity Kills the Gap.

​This post also appears on TWIB.

Speedrun Through Your Favorite Sci-Fi Movies

If you love science, you probably also love science fiction (sci-fi) movies.  Sometimes you just don't have the time to watch the entire movie, but you need a quick fix. I found a great YouTube user account - 1A4Studio - who does beautiful hand drawn versions of sci-fi flicks that are only one minute long. They are very well done and hilarious - you'll definitely see your favorite scenes!  

40 seconds into Star Wars A New Hope is a marvelous reenactment of the Obi Wan - Darth Vader fight. 26 seconds into the Matrix you see Morpheus doing the STOP TRYING TO HIT ME AND HIT ME stance during the dojo fight. 40 seconds into Back to The Future shows George McFly knocking the stuffing out of Biff with a well-timed Mortal Kombat uppercut.

If you can't see the videos below, please click here.​

​This post also appears on TWIB.

Curiosity Kills The Gap: Helping Kids with STEM

This week's White House Science Fair is another great example of presidents using the White House to push a scientific agenda. Levar Burton, one of the co-hosts of the event, ​often repeated Obama's saying that you should be invited to the White House whether you win an sports championship or a science fair. Not only is it great to see young scientists celebrated on a national stage, but you also get super adorable photos like this:

​Levar Burton and Bill Nye The Science Guy help interview three young budding scientists

It's a beautiful scene, isn't it? It's one that needs to replicated in cities and towns across the country. Not only do we owe it to the future generations to be scientifically literate, but we need to avoid being among the bottom of developed countries for math and science. The gap needs to be eliminated.

Philadelphia does a better job than most cities when it comes to promoting science. I've previously covered the Philadelphia Science Festival, ​which turned the heart of the city into a big playground of ... bugs and stuff. The George Washington Carver Science Fair (yes, the website sucks ... Facebook is somewhat better) gives elementary and high school kids a chance to show off their science skills, with judges from the community (like my friends the Black Tribbles). But even with these resource, the everyday school experience of a significant amount of students is devoid of the science resources that are needed for success. The situation is even worse with other cities that don't have fair at all.

​All in a day's work at the Philadelphia Science Festival

When most people think science resources, they mention labs, circuit boards to wire, hydrochloric acid to burn things, fetal pigs to dissect, etc.  These are all important, but they are secondary to the truth issue. The most important part is making sure that kids have the space to be curious and creative. This is extremely important because kids with all the resources in the world will waste them if they don't have a spirit of curiosity. Similarly, kids with nothing have and will continue to change the world of scientific discovery because they were allowed to poke around, fail, and fail again in their creative pursuits.

​Panelist at the WURD Speaks: Blackout event in Philadelphia. From L-R - Robert W. Bogle, President & CEO of the Philadelphia Tribune; Brigitte Daniel, Executive Vice President of Wilco Electronic Systems; Sara Lomax-Reese, President & General Manager of 900AM-WURD; Mignon Clyburn, FCC Commissioner; William Crowder, Managing Director of DreamIt Ventures & Lead Advisor of the Comcast Ventures; Navarrow Wright, CTO Interactive One

I attended an event by Philly's only Black owned talk radio station WURD called Blackout: Reinventing Media in the Digital Age. There was an amazing panel, including FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, that all echoed a similar concern - we need to instill an environment of entrepreneurial spirit, curiosity, and creativity in our kids at a very young age. We live in a time where we can do research on anything that a kid displays affinity towards and help them understand it on a deeper level.  This is how we can kill the gap between have and have not when it comes to science education both within our country, and between our country and the rest of the world.

Smithsonian #TimeNav Event: Tweets & Photos

Below are my tweets and photos from the Smithsonian Air & Space  Museum's Time and Navigation exhibit which opens Friday, April 12th. ​ The exhibit features navigation the evolution of navigation technology from the sea, to the air, to space, and now in our smartphones. Yesterday's preview has more detail.  Check out the photos below!

Smithsonian #TimeNav: Back Seat Drivers

The Smithsonian National Air and Space museum is unveiling a new exhibit entitled Time & Navigation: The Untold Story of Getting From Here to There. The exhibit will focus on navigators - the folks that served as the back seat drivers for many famous pilots, drivers, captains, and others. Exhibits from famous names such as sea Captain Charles Wilkes and pilot Charles Lindbergh will be featured, as well as Mariner 10, the first spacecraft to reach Mercury.

An excerpt from the Smithsonian blog reads as follows:​

Today, the navigator as a crew member has largely disappeared from most commercial and military long-distance operations, replaced by microprocessors in the form of GPS and inertial navigation systems, but from the 1930s to the 1980s, the navigator was an essential crewmember on many long-distance commercial and military flights.

Be sure to follow my on Twitter (@ShareefJackson) as I will be live tweeting the media preview this morning from 9am - 11am EST.​ I'll be using the hashtag #TimeNav. 

The exhibit will open to the public on Friday, April 12th - make sure to check it out next time you're in DC!