[NAEP] MPES newsletter

[Dawn Wiseman]

May 23, 2008
	Volume 1, Issue 10

Our newsletter is just a little early this issue 
because of events this coming Sunday. That's when 
Phoenix, NASA's latest mission to Mars, is slated 
to land on our neighbouring planet.

Phoenix Mars Mission
Phoenix is tasked with looking for signs of life 
and livable (for humans) habitat on Mars. Pretty 
much everything you want to know about the 
mission can be found at:
http://phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu/

Phoenix contains a few key Canadian components, a 
weather station and a robotic arm which will let 
it dig up to 3 feet (just slightly less than a 
metre) into the Martian soil. On-board chemistry 
labs will then analyse samples and send results 
back to Earth. All this information and more is 
in a nice summary article in the Washington Post 
from May 19, 2008.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/18/AR2008051801761.html

Finally, if you can get your head around the 
argument, here's a thought-provoking article by 
Nick Bostrum of Oxford University on why he hopes 
the search for life on other planets turns up 
nothing. It's in the MIT Technology Review which 
requires (free) registration for viewing.
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/20569/


Fun science stuff
It was cold and damp in Cape Breton for the 
Atlantic Native Teachers Education Conference. 
Despite the weather, the conference was a great 
success attracting well over 500 teachers from 
Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, PEI and 
a smattering of other places.

We welcome to the listserv, and the newsletter, 
all those people who subscribed during our ANTEC 
workshops. We had a really good time at ANTEC 
even if squeezing 7 experiments into 40 minutes 
was a test in speed talking and endurance. As 
promised the here are the links for most of the 
experiments we did Š

What we eat
Eating Well with Canada's Food Guide - First Nations, Inuit and Métis
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/pubs/fnim-pnim/index_e.html

It's cold, pass the fat
Blubber mania
http://resources.yesican-science.ca/trek/tea/blubber_mania.html

Density
Steve Spangler Science
http://www.stevespanglerscience.com/experiment/00000051

Polymers, polymers
Cornstarch goop
http://littleshop.physics.colostate.edu/Try%20At%20Home/goorecipeone.htm
http://www.science-house.org/CO2/activities/polymer/oobleck.html
http://www.stevespanglerscience.com/experiment/00000088

Glue goop
http://www.stevespanglerscience.com/experiment/00000039
http://www.science-house.org/CO2/activities/polymer/sillyputty.html

Also, the powder used in diapers can be purchased 
online in a number of locations, but the one we 
used is from Steve Spangler Science.
http://www.stevespanglerscience.com/product/1448


Maverick teacher bridges the digital divide
Central Middle School of Science teacher Michael 
Warren propels himself across the classroom, 
pantomiming a 13-year-old rushing to turn in an 
assignment at his desk.

He looks like Will Farrell on "Saturday Night Live" mimicking a teenager.

Warren, who was recognized as one of the 
country's best teachers last fall when he won the 
prestigious Milken Educator award, in many ways 
fits the traditional definition of any good 
teacher: He's dedicated, he puts in long hours 
and he knows his material.

But he is also a maverick who believes his first 
job is to entertain before teach and who pushes 
his colleagues to embrace the culture of students 
-- that means not just performing to keep their 
attention but integrating their technology into 
the classroom.

"Kids go home and have very, very busy lives," he 
says, pointing out that they text and 
instant-message on their phones and computers and 
spend hours on their MySpace pages.

If teachers don't tap into that dedication to 
technology, they aren't reaching their students, 
he says.

Read the rest at http://www.adn.com/education/story/404255.html
Thanks to Pamela Bumsted for the link.


Seeing the path: the Skownan Vision Seekers Initiative
From the latest newsletter of the Canadian Council on Learning

For years, the school bus that criss-crosses the 
Skownan First Nation has been full of students 
each September. In most communities, this would 
be a sight that would signal the start of a 
promising school year; but to the eyes of many 
residents in the northern Manitoba community, the 
bus served as a bitter reminder of past 
disappointments.

Located about 300 km northwest of Winnipeg, 
Skownan has faced its share of challenges, 
ranging from high unemployment and alcoholism to 
vandalism and drug abuse. But it's the 
community's poor high-school completion rates 
that leaders say are at the root of many of its 
problems.

"That bus came back nearly empty every June," 
says Dana Rungay, a child and family services 
worker on the reserve. "Students would drop out 
and then they were just wandering aimlessly."

According to local records, between 1995 and 1999 
a total of 60 students enrolled in high school, 
yet only nine graduated. That's an 85% dropout 
rate; nearly six times the average for Manitoba 
during the same period  (15%) and seven times the 
national rate of 12% (according to Statistics 
Canada's Labour Force Survey).

It's a track record that none of the 600 
residents of the Ojibway community felt proud of. 
_  _"Everybody has a basic need to feel like 
you're contributing and doing something 
meaningful," says Rungay. "These kids who dropped 
out had nothingŠ.[How can] a person have a future 
with a Grade 8 education?"

In 2000, local leaders decided to do take action. 
In April they founded the Skownan Vision Seekers 
Initiative, a community focussed program that 
provides residents on reserves a unique hands-on 
strategy to solving social problems.

Unlike government initiatives, where outside 
experts are brought in to fix a perceived 
problem, Vision Seekers looks first to community 
members for a possible solution. What resulted 
was a year-long consultation with local residents 
that proved both insightful and inspirational.

Read the rest at 
http://www.ccl-cca.ca/CCL/Newsroom/PracticallySpeaking/20080509SkownanVisionSeekers.htm?Language=EN

It's about the ice, not the polar bears
Check out Bob MacDonald's comment on the US 
adding polar bears to its list of threatened 
species. As he points out, "the plan backfired as 
the U.S. government immediately stated that 
listing the bear as threatened will not force 
action on climate change. Instead, they put a 
restriction on hunting, which is not the main 
threat to polar bear populations. The issue is 
saving the bear's habitat, the ice, which is 
disappearing because of climate change."

http://www.cbc.ca/technology/quirks-blog/2008/05/its_about_the_ice_not_the_bear.html



Upcoming events
June 30-July 4, 2008
International Commission on Mathematical Instruction
Statistics Education in School Mathematics
Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico
http://www.ugr.es/~icmi/iase_study/


Next issue
The next issue of the MPES newsletter is due out 
in two weeks. If you have any information you'd 
like to share with colleagues please email it to 
dawn at nativeaccess.com.