Response to "Yes We Can"

I found this article to be a great read after last week's reading "Unemployment Training". What I liked most about this article is that it supported the idea that teachers and parents can make a difference in the education system.

Most of the control over education in our country lies with the government. While it is idealistic to say that education is important and should matter to everyone, this is not always the case. Even voters who don't have children in school systems may not be concerned with the educational needs our country faces.

Parents and teachers, however, should use their power to enact change. For example, the parents who used test scores as a means to change the testing. The education a child is receiving should be a concern for the teacher and parent as well.

I like how the article pointed out that we can do something about the problems in school systems. It does not have to remain how it is, but it takes motivation and hardwork to change our school systems.

An idea in Monday's class discussion really got me thinking: if a student can't have a hands-on experience with something, maybe that isn't something you teach them in science. I found this idea to be very surprising, and challenging everything I thought I knew about science, and teaching science. For example, we discussed the idea of teaching students about the solar system, but since students can't directly experience different planets, perhaps it is something that should not be taught in science. If students simply read about the planets, that is more of a language arts activity, rather than a science one.

This discussion has caused me to reflect on an experience I had student teaching. I was responsible for teaching my 4th graders about different habitats as part of their science education. But now that I reflect back on what we did, I am wondering if I truly was teaching them science. Since my students had no direct contact or hands-on experience with jungles, grasslands, forests, and deserts, did I teach them science? They studied pictures of different habitats, learned about the anmials and plants that lived in them, and then created models of a habitat. Yes, they applied their knowledge of habitats to constuct their own models, but the way in which they acquired the knowledge was not through a hands-on experience.

This idea is definitely different for me. I had never really thought of science in this light before, but I will say that I agree with it. Science is much more valuable for studets, I think, if they can experience it in some authentic way for themselves. Otherwise, considering my habitats unit as an example, students are simply acquiring knowledge in a more "traditional" form.