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Telling Tales

I've been thinking about ways to make Science real. If we want students to be STEM literate, then we need to find ways for science to fit into our daily lives. Not an easy task, for it to happen, Science must come down out of it's ivory tower. C.P. Snow wrote of the divided cultures of science and the arts, he proposed a third culture, to bridge the gap between the two sides. And, to some extent, we've seen this happen with the growing popularity of entertainment such as NPR's RadioLab, and PBS's Nova. While I love these shows, they don't blend science into our daily lives. Jonah Lehrer, author of Proust was a Neuroscientist, characterizes the third culture, in an article in SEED, as scientists talking directly to the public, an improvement, but short of the goal. Lehrer proposes a fourth culture;

“The premise of this movement—perhaps a fourth culture—is that neither culture can exist by itself. Its goal will be to cultivate a positive feedback loop, in which works of art lead to new scientific experiments, which lead to new works of art and so on. Instead of ignoring each other, or competing, or co-opting each other in naïve or superficial ways, science and the arts will truly impact each other. The old intellectual boundaries will disappear. “ J.Lehrer, SEED, January 16, 2008

Interesting stuff, but how do teachers realize this fourth culture in the classroom? One way is through cross-discipline teaching units, working with colleagues, but building such collaborative schemes is a difficult task. Perhaps there's another way, something a little more accessible to the average teacher. Perhaps we could become story tellers. I'm currently working on a series to teach measurement and as an experiment, I've used a story about my dear grandmother to teach the need for standardized units. It's the heart rending story of the loss of a favorite recipe. I excerpt it here, you can find the full 5 part article in the feature section. The story is intended to be told while actually mixing dough and is interspersed with measuring hints.

My grandmother was a wonderful woman, naturally, since she was Irish. Like most Irish grandmothers, back in the day, she baked those delicious traditional Irish soda breads. I particularly liked her soda farls, a breakfast staple. I liked them so much, I decided to learn to bake them myself. I found a notepad and pen, and rose with the roosters, ready to record her recipe as she prepared to bake the mornings supply. She began with flour, four fistfuls to be exact, and then added a teacup of buttermilk...wait a minute, “How much buttermilk is in a teacup? “ I asked. “This much”, she said, holding up a cracked and battered teacup. My plan was in ruins, I had no way to record her recipe, the ingredients were measured in units that were inseparable from her. Alas, my grandmother has been gone for these many years, and her ancient teacup and calloused fists are gone with her. I'll never taste her farls again, and the world is smaller place from the loss, all for the lack of a standard measure.

Stories like this humanize science, and the teacher, and provide a memorable learning experience. I know I can't pick up a measuring cup, without remembering the incident, may my students will remember units in the same way.