In this article, grade four teacher Diane Petersen writes:
Ian’s work as a scientist began with a contradiction: “The scientists said that you can’t find any horny toads here. And I said, ‘My dad and I go out and catch them.’” The thirteen-year-old has now traveled to Idaho and California, where he and three classmates surprised working scientists by describing new discoveries about where the 3-inch-long lizards live and what they eat. “One man said that we presented better than most college students did,” says Ian. Ian is one of more than a dozen of my students at Waterville Elementary School, in Waterville, Washington, who have spoken at scientific conferences throughout the country. Their subject: short-horned lizards (Phrynosoma douglasii), also called horny toads, which are native to our rural area and are a part of my students’ world. The creatures aren’t an obvious vehicle for teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic. But through their work on horny toads as part of a nationwide project called NatureMapping, my students honed those very skills and made a real contribution to science. Read more: http://www.edutopia.org/naturemapping|Naturemapping Watch a related video: Naturemapping video – toad tracking (Source: edutopia.org) |
It costs Canada $2.5 billion every year for remedial education because of delayed interventions or negative early experiences Featured VideoPrograms at Work |