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Remote Ready Biology Learning Activities

Remote Ready Biology Learning Activities has 50 remote-ready activities, which work for either your classroom or remote teaching.

Topic: Science Education


This forum is for discussion of thoughts arising from and extending materials in Serendip's Science Educaton section. Comments entered here will be automatically posted. Comments not meant to be posted can be sent by Serendip.

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Year: - Current Postings - 1999/2001 - 1998 - 1997 - 1996 - 1995


Name: Candi Corcoran
Username: ccorcora@coe.drexel.edu
Subject: The dread malaise
Date: Mon Jun 26 16:23:19 EDT 1995
Comments:
Hmmm...have you ever watched ³Vanishing Worlds² on the Discovery Channel? Each show focuses on some ³primitive² tribe and its members daily lives. The fascinating thing about this show is that when a tribe lives in an area where both food and shelter are ensured, everybodyıs really pretty nice to everyone else. And they donıt have a word for ³war.² And they donıt kill more animals/harvest more food than they need. And they take care of the children of the animals they kill and raise them as members of their families. And everyone makes music and dances - no excuses. And everyone makes some sort of contribution to the tribe in their own unique manner. And so on. Vast generalizations aside, it seems we do indeed have minds that think and explore and create...theyıre just buried away beneath countless layers of necessity, of trying to fit into a harsh and nasty world where people look at you funny if you donıt have a Good Job and if you spend your life dreaming of better things. Who has time to dream when itıs hard enough for the average person to just get by? So I guess, technically, I fall into the ³thinking is a luxury² subset...but Iım not convinced that thatıs so wrong. You mention that the world wasnıt made for people, and perhaps thatıs where you and I differ. I think people, just like most other species, spend most of their time just trying to make ends meet and trying to get along with the other animals in their neighborhood. I also think that once an animal thinks it knows the best way to do something, it will tend to stick with that system and get on to the next difficult problem, no matter whether it applies to getting food, securing a place to live, etc. Despite all this, I agree with you in that I believe that Really Thinking about how inane most of our daily routines are would be quite useful, especially given the brevity of our lifespans, but I also believe that as a society, Necessity still keeps us a fair distance away from such introspection.
Name: anonymous
Username:
Subject: Brain and Beh. Inst.
Date: Mon Jul 24 15:13:01 EDT 1995
Comments:
This past week and this coming week approximately 20 of us, teachers in the S.D. of Phila. have met to enjoy neurons, axons and food (Thanks Arthur!). This has been a "virtual" learning experience for us all. Thanks Robin, Paul and the rest of the Bryn Mawr faculty. Please write back, Jennifer and Wayne
Name: jackie,rich
Username:
Subject: Brain & Behavior
Date: Mon Jul 24 15:32:34 EDT 1995
Comments:
Dear Jennifer, Richard and myself have enjoyed this week and will be sorry when it is over. I love the oatmeal cookies,Carl's jokes, Perrys' and mydeep discussion. Richard is speechless but he wants to remine everyone that we all have a soul and is looking forwards to the subject of addictions because we are all there. See youat the next beerfest which you can find on the net. Jackie and Rich. 
Name: Carl Flaxman
Username:
Subject: THE FLOATING FINGER
Date: Mon Jul 24 15:41:59 EDT 1995
Comments:
A great experiment is the floating finger ( sometimes called hotdog) experiment. Place your two index fingers pointing at each other at the height of your nose and 10-12 inches from your eyes. Then, look at but above your fingers into the distance. Surprize! What seems to be floating between your two fingers? Now for the most exciting part ! Explain why this happens. Employ all the wisdom gained from the Brain/Behavior Institute to explain this phenomenon. Good Luck and your stipend depends on the correct answer. C. Flaxman
Name: zoe cohen
Username: lpaul@opal.tufts.edu
Subject: thinking and ap bio class...
Date: Sun Aug 6 21:32:13 EDT 1995
Comments:
wow! i can't say how much i agree with the statements made in the essay about thinking and education. i have just graduated from high school (and will be a freshman at haverford in the fall.. :) and i spent the year doing a huge amount of thinking about life in general, but usually about school and the nature of learning. my experiances really do exemplify the " not enough thinking " problem. all my life i have adored science. i took a much-anticipated AP biology course this past year in school, and aced the AP test ( the only one i aced) at the end of the year. i knew my facts cold. however, i really did not enjoy my bio class at all. most of the time, it really did feel like our teacher was just stuffing facts down our throats, and not thinking at all about what he was teaching us. as it turns out, i love to think even more than i love science, and i often came up with rather complex questions about the facts being thrown at us. unfortunately, my teacher would never try to discuss my questions with me, in order to try and answer them. either he knew the answer, or, (more often), he didn't. this left me incredibly frustrated. most of my friends (who are usually pretty astute thinkers) never understood my frustration. it seemed that they had fallen into the pattern of the bio class, which didn't include thinking about the facts we were being taught. one (among many) of my worries about college is whether or not i will ever be "taught how to think" in a science course. i took (and loved ) a beginning philosophy course in school last year in which i learned a great deal about how to think ( mostly from discussions with friends after class). but my science courses have never taught me how to think, or even given me a chance to practice thinking scientifically. if this continues, how on earth could i ever be prepared to even try to begin research? sure, i'll know the facts, but will i be able to think in such a way that my research process will make any sense? i fear floating without direction as a result of a completely fact-based education. so those are my comments...guess i'll go read other peoples' now.


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