education
grrlscientist | February 8, 2008tags: Evolution: Education and Outreach, evolution journal, open access evolution, teaching, education
There is a new journal about teaching evolution that is now available and it appears to be completely open access, too! This journal, Evolution: Education and Outreach focuses on promoting accurate understanding and comprehensive teaching of evolutionary theory for a wide audience, although it specifically targets K-16 students, teachers and scientists. This journal is actively seeking contributions of (1) peer reviewed evolutionary science; (2) peer-reviewed educational papers on curricula…
bioephemera | February 8, 2008I finally got around to visiting freerice.com, a vocabulary game that lets you "win" donations of rice for needy countries. (Yes, it's like the SAT, but some of us find that kind of thing fun.) The words start off easy, but ramp up to a pleasing level of difficulty; I played for about ten minutes and hovered around a score of 50, peaking at 52.
How does it work? Advertisers pay per click, and the rice is purchased (mostly in Pakistan and Japan) and distributed by the United Nations' World Food Program. This story describes how the program is helping refugees in Bangladesh; 20 grains of rice…
drorzel | February 8, 2008I'm currently serving as one of the faculty members involved with a new-ish residential life initiative aimed at raising the intellectual tone around campus. A big part of this is trying to get faculty members to do things in the campus housing spaces. This has all the logistical hassles you would expect, as so we're always in the market for low-key options.
After a conversation with a colleague, I've been kicking around the idea of a low-key sort of film festival-- asking individual faculty members to come to the house one night, and show one of their favorite movies. The idea here would not…
gregladen | February 7, 2008Ben Dunlap tells the story of Sandor Teszler, a Hungarian man he met at Wofford College. In telling Teszler's dramatic life story, which arcs from the Holocaust to the American Deep South of the 1950s, Dunlap shares some deep and, ultimately, moving lessons about justice -- and the power of lifelong learning. Sit back and listen.
gregladen | February 1, 2008An increasingly large number of K through 12 students (in the tens of thousands or more) are getting some or all of their education on line. Typically, the on line resources are provided by private corporate vendors contracting to individuals or in some cases school districts, and the target audience tends to be middle school or high school.
School districts and teachers (including unions) are typically reticent to support this shift. While such groups may be resisting online offerings because it constitutes direct competition, they also have valid complaints that online learning, like…
gregladen | January 28, 2008The Twin Cities Creation Science Association Home School Science Fair, held each year in February, in Har Mar Mall, Roseville, Minnesota, will occur this year on Saturday & Sunday, February 16 and 17, 2008.
The Application Deadline is January 31st, 2008 ($5.00 entry fee)
You can register after January 31st at the door for only three bucks more!
Here are the entry guidelines:
This fair is open to all Home School students in the greater Twin Cities area.
Each student may enter only one project.
There will be only individual projects, and team projects will not be allowed.
Each exhibit…
grrlscientist | January 23, 2008tags: Speciation in Birds, Trevor Price, book review, evolution, birds
The question of what is a species and how they arise has generated numerous discussions and tremendous controversy throughout the decades. This interest is more than academic, as any bird watcher will tell you since the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) routinely splits one species into two or lumps two species into one, thereby wreaking havoc with many birders' "life lists"; that master list of species seen that is kept by each birder. More than once, I have heard birders question the validity of one or another of the…
drorzel | January 23, 2008I haven't linked to Inside Higher Ed in a few days, but lest you think I've forgotten them, they have a short piece today about the results of a survey of employers "with at least 25 employees and significant hiring of recent college graduates," regarding the preparation of their recent hires.
It turns out that employers aren't as frustrated with the skills of new graduates as some politicians and policy makers suggest. In a number of areas, employers appear to think graduates are coming out well positioned. And while employers would love to see better assessment tools used in college (as you…
clock | January 23, 2008On the heels of David Warlick's session on using online tools in the science classroom and the student blogging panel comes the announcement that SPARC has declared the winners of the first SPARKY Awards for student-generated videos on the theme of openess of information. The winner is Habib Yazdi, a senior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with the video entitled "Share." The three winning videos are under the fold:
clock | January 22, 2008On the heels of David Warlick's session on using online tools in the science classroom, this initiative is really exciting:
Teachers, Students, Web Gurus, and Foundations Launch Campaign to Transform Education, Call for Free, Adaptable Learning Materials Online
Cape Town, January 22nd, 2008--A coalition of educators, foundations, and internet pioneers today urged governments and publishers to make publicly-funded educational materials available freely over the internet.
The Cape Town Open Education Declaration, launched today, is part of a dynamic effort to make learning and teaching…
gregladen | January 19, 2008This is Part 1 because there is more than one part. But I'm only going to do one of them, so it is Part 1 of 1. There is more than one "kind" of home schooler, home schooling parent, home schooling family, etc., and thus there are multiple attitudes. But a good chunk of the home schooling population, represented by these excerpts from their own rhetoric, are more than a little annoying, and are the reason why we should always be suspicious of home schooling and home schoolers until we see their credentials.
Home Schooling Is a Good Choice for Christian Parenting
If you want to impart a…
gregladen | January 15, 2008If you follow the creationist news stories from around the country, you get a lot of the same exact thing over and over again, and it is hard to identify the novel or persistent elements in the flow of information. But increasingly it is clear that Bill Foster of St. Petersburg Florida is somewhat novel and starting to look persistent.
Foster was a relatively typical family values fiscal conservative kind of city council member. Term limits have forced him out of his job, which is too bad because maybe he would have just continued along that course minding his own business and not doing…
gregladen | January 13, 2008It is science fair season! Elmer's Inc is cranking out the three-part display boards, Office Max is stocking up on its colored paper and glue sticks, and thousands upon thousands of kids are working out the fine details of the hypothesis they want to test using an experiment that can be demonstrated in the Science Fair.
Pretty boring, actually.
Unless you focus on the Christian Creationist Science Fairs. They are Always so much fun. And remember, Greg Laden's Blog here at scienceblogs.com is your Christian Creation Science Creationist Science Fair Center! Keep checking back!
For now, I…
gregladen | January 11, 2008Here's a novel idea for creationists: Be honest!
As you know, the Institute for Creation Research is trying to get an online Masters Degree in "science education" approved in Texas. A faux committee comprised of nincompoops and creationists has approved the degree at the first stage, and it is now being considered by the Texas higher education commission. (Details here)
A recent report indicates that the Texas Commissioner of Higher Education has chimed in on the suggestion that this degree simply be called a "degree in creation studies." Interesting solution.
Apparently, one of the…
clock | January 11, 2008If you look at the Program page on the wiki for the Science Blogging Conference, you will see, for the Saturday program, there are 12 excellent sessions, a panel and a talk. Each has a discussion page which you should edit to add your own thoughts, ideas and questions.
One of the sessions I expect to have a big draw, particularly with so many science teachers at the conference, is the session on Teaching Science: using online tools in the science classroom, led by a real pro on the topic - David Warlick. David already has an ongoing discussion of the session on his own blog where you are…
grrlscientist | January 9, 2008tags: carnival of education, blog carnivals
The 153rd edition of the Carnival of Education is now available for you to read.
mikethemadbiologist | January 9, 2008Francisco Ayala in the most recent edition of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Science makes a good distinction between religion and science (italics mine):
Science and religion concern different aspects of the human experience. Scientific explanations are based on evidence drawn from examining the natural world and rely exclusively on natural processes to account for natural phenomena. Scientific explanations are subject to empirical tests by means of observation and experimentation and are subject to the possibility of modification and rejection. Religious faith, in contrast, does…
grrlscientist | January 8, 2008tags: Carnival of Homeschooling, education, blog carnivals
The Carnival of Homeschooling is a new blog carnival for me but it is well-established, as you will see in the most recent issue -- it is jam-packed with lots of links to follow and read. If you peek closely, you'll find that they included an entry from me that might seem a little .. unusual .. when you think of the stereotype of what homeschooling is all about.