Mermaid's Butterfly Garden

Mermaid's Butterfly Garden utube

What turned on the light?

 

Jeremy is a tiny boy. He has sandy blond hair, with blue eyes sized large in proportion to his pentagonal face.
There was nothing remarkable about him except his constant grin.

His artwork in Kindergarten was a struggle. When the class was learning the Human Figure, I taught the children about different colors closest to their own skin color. By laying the colored Art-Stix  on their arms, they could  see which color came closest. Jeremy picked an aqua green.

Most people don't know that in mixing colors for human skin, artists add green.

Despite it being odd for a Kindergartner to pick green for human skin color, Jeremy was not 'wrong' and I told him why. This explanation probably was more than he could understand but by the tone of my voice, he could probably tell his different choice was entirely "ok".

I came away from that class wondering: "is Jeremy an intuitive genius?" Watching him for the next two years, my gut feeling concluded that he was not. His work in Kindergarten and all through First Grade showed no repeat of genius. In fact, I can't recall any other work he did. That's what I consider unremarkable. Unremarkable work but great grin. He always put forth great effort, was a mild mannered person and was altogether a sweetheart and a pleasure to have in my class.

Second grade for Jeremy started two weeks ago. Due to hurricane days off and holidays, yesterday was the first day he came to my new program, "Science/Art".

Knowing the bulk of the students since they entered school in Kindergarten is a real bonus on getting work done the first day of my class. Introductions were not necessary and I know their work strengths by the time they are in Second Grade.

My Apple Snail shells proved a hit with this group too. On the tables ready for the physical examination of the Apple Snail shells were thermometers, flexible tape measures, weight balances,  two types of magnifying glasses and hard rulers. The children brought body tools with them: eyes that see, ears that hear, noses for smelling, fingers and faces for touching. (No tasting please!)  And for those who wished to write things down, the tables had pencils, crayons and large white papers.

After demonstrating the use of the tape measure and thermometer, I set the children free to explore. A room buzzing with noises of students busily working their curiosity up is the sound of science.

Walking around to hear what they are discovering is how I kept aware of their progress.

Coming to Jeremy's table, I stopped. This little pinch-of-salt-of-a-boy had no grin on. He looked very serious! I had to see what changed Jeremy's normal behavior.

 He had placed his snail shell into the yellow balance cup and the balance cup dropped to the table. I watched him take a crayon and place it in the red balancer cup. Jeremy was actively measuring. Jeremy was thinking! He was thinking hard! The shell weight did not match his expectations so he formed his own problem to solve.

His young pentagonal face now wore the self-respect of a man in deep thought.

I helped him work the problem out.

The conversation went like this:

Teacher - "Jeremy...did you think the shell would drop the balance cup before you put it in?"
Jeremy - "no...I thought it was much lighter"
Teacher - "I see you putting a crayon in the red balancer cup..why are you doing that? "
Jeremy - "to balance it out."
Teacher, -" how many crayons (these are the big fat crayons) do you predict will balance it out?"
Jeremy- "eight", (He said that with assurance).

For the next few moments, Jeremy struggled to balance for the equilibrium.  He discovered that the fat crayons were too heavy. So he tried broken fat crayon pieces. He was right on track but got stuck because he wouldn't consider purposely breaking crayons in my class to get that needed balance. That got him stuck. I suggested the smaller, thinner broken crayons. He fished through the cups of crayons on the table to find his balance equivalent. When he succeeded, we talked again:


Teacher -" How many crayons did you use?"
Jeremy -"Five pieces".

The photo of that selection is at the top and bottom. It was a particularly sensitive balance.

The point of this story is this: Jeremy didn't show much curiosity in Kindergarten. I honestly suspect that green skin choice  was because he liked that color the best. The aqua green  is the most popular color of the extended set of Art-Stix. I believe he sort of  "went with the flow" than having an intuition peak. Through First Grade, he was exactly the same: he did his lessons to the best of his ability with no outstanding talents or problems. There's no negativity in this assessment; this is a perfectly excellent way to be.

I had no reason to suspect he changed in Second Grade. He was still small. If he grew over the summer, it was a smidgen. He hadn't lost any teeth in that lovely grand grin.


But there was a huge change!  His "thinking lights" clicked on.

My question is: "what turned his lights on?"  If his physiology didn't mature very much, I had to guess the stimulus came from elsewhere.

Was it the science tools that brought it out? This is a new stimulus in my class.

From what I've seen in the classes three weeks into this new hybrid program of Science/Art, I would say that Science tools incites tinkering....and tinkering incites thinking.

The Science/Art approach is different from Fine Arts. Many children get stuck in knowing "what" to draw or even how to express themselves. Jeremy's complete involvement with solving a problem he created  is one of the finest examples of how I hoped the Science/Art program would draw out curiosity.

 The "lights' went on for me too! I am improving the lessons all the time. Because of Jeremy, all the students coming after him will be supplied a second set of balancers.  Because of him, I now know that his shell equals the weight of a half green/yellow, a quarter of a white, a slightly larger quarter of a dark red, a quarter of a sienna brown and one whole fat purple crayon.  Measuring in colors...a unique exchange.

And now I know that Jeremy can think empirically. That's a light turned on.

Meditation on a Life Eaten

Apple Snails do not abandon their shells.

One young boy in 3rd Grade said they taste like fish. He grinned when everyone in the classroom choked and coughed and gagged. Only gladly would he eat it again, he said. I whimpered. He ate my new found friend. And that's when I realized that my collection of apple snail shells were found as the result of massive dining.

How do scientists feel both for the life of the snail and for the Kite Hawk which only survives in the Everglades due to the Apple Snail?!  Are the two chambers of the heart divided so we can feel both equally? Perhaps the incoming bluish blood for the lament of the Apple Snail's death and the oxygen rich blood happy for the continued life of the predator? 

There is no room in a classroom to side with snail eaters or non-snail eaters. Both are accepted in a school where tolerance is taught.

But the lesson is this: if over-development and pollution do not end the wasteful destruction of the life of the Apple Snail, the life of the Kite Hawk, now endangered, will perish altogether.

The Clever Snail Doodler

 

This photo is a collection of clues of a "Who Done It" mystery. 

Is the kindergartner with the magnifying glass examining the apple snail shell? Or is the child looking at the crayon marks on the apple snail shell? Did this kindergartner put those crayon marks on the apple snail shell? Did this child choose green to emulate the Granny Apple or was that an intuitional serendipity?

And  most seriously of all, how does a teacher deal with snail shell vandalism? 

Answering the last question first: The teacher holds her breath about the snail shell vandalism. 

Nothing is said. Obviously, the kindergarten child needed to test out the surface of the shell  for its capacity to hold crayon marks. This was not vandalism; it was surface texture inquiry and discovery. 

Marking up the snail shell is not encouraged  because other students have equal right to clean material. Green Crayons are not removal marks. And that's a good reason to hold a rules and behavior lecture.

But there are moments only to behold and not to teach. The teacher was beholding the birthing of science inquiry by a child who only yesterday, entered school for the first time in a 5 year old life.  

With that awareness, there are no other questions to answer. The kindergartner "done" it and "done" it right.

The Apple Snail Rides Again

The Apple Snail is slower than a racehorse or a cheetah but much faster than a plant. And it's about the same rate of speed as Mrs. Giveon on any given day due to her busted knees. Understanding that snails are not necessarily "slow" without having a rate of speed in comparison set the pace of the Science/Art learning experience today.

Opening day at school meant a longer than usual attendance time (more time/speed comparisons!) . After the opening twang of the tuning fork greeting the children back, we got touchy-feelie with the largest fresh water snail on earth.

Snails are part of South Florida children's lives. They race around the gardens or slug along the canal banks. Understanding one's own backyard is the best place to start curiosity investigation.

No sooner did I plop the snail shell in each child's hand did they begin to investigate with rulers, thermometers, two types of magnifying glasses and unaided sight. (Or sight corrected glasses.)

Discussing why the snails change shells due to outgrowth, one student discovered a crack in the shell with the magnifying glass. He said, "I see why it needed to leave!!!!!" Whether or not that was the true reason for the crack, the child made a logical connection to our class discussion.

Imagination, investigation and self-expression...that's Science/Art in a snail's shell.

Fat colored crayons and freshly sharpened pencils teetering in the balance scales enabled the children to express the spirals and shapes of their long whiskered Apple Snail.

It was also their first-hand hand, first -day exposure to  perfect geometry.

The Ancient Greek and Roman artists and architects called it the Sacred or Golden Geometry. Masters Artist / Scientist Leonardo Da Vinci drew the most famous Man in the Circle in this perfect geometry. It is also called the Golden Ratio. Below are the proportions in math. Mathematicians use numbers:  Artists use their eyeballs to sight it.  Artists who are trained Classically eventually zing into the golden proportions instinctively. This golden ratio is so significant that we, in modern times, take it for granted. But it is the very reason our culture uses the rectangle shape for our school note paper. By contrast, do we write on clay spheres? No...not usually.



Exposing children to perfection in mathematical ratios whether they know it yet or not, will positively influence their sense of balance in their art and science life to come. Their sense of balance will become "natural". 

 

The Apple Snail's perfect ratio from the starting spiral to it's tuba-like opening is the closest I could get to the Chambered Nautilus. And it is our own Florida native creature...vital to our wildlife habitat. Unravel the snail and you spiral into the greatest galaxies of learning.

 http://www.geometrycode.com/sacred-geometry/

The Golden Ratio

The golden ratio (a.k.a. phi ratio a.k.a. sacred cut a.k.a. golden mean a.k.a. divine proportion) is another fundamental measure that seems to crop up almost everywhere, including crops. (The golden ratio is about 1.618033988749894848204586834365638117720309180…) The golden ratio is the unique ratio such that the ratio of the whole to the larger portion is the same as the ratio of the larger portion to the smaller portion. As such, it symbolically links each new generation to its ancestors, preserving the continuity of relationship as the means for retracing its lineage.

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_geometry

The Apple Snail's First Day of School

Teacher's Pet

 

 

 The first day back to school is tomorrow, August 20, 2012. This year starts a brand new program: Visual Literacy - Approach to Science Education in the Elementary School through Art Elements and Principles. 

Wow. That's a mouthful for any gastropod. To shorten it for the little teeth in a Kindergartner, I refer to this program as "Science Art". It's in the Science Lab rather than the Art Lab but only because that's where I landed this year. Curiosity can be investigating anywhere on Earth....or even on Mars as proven by our summer successful landing of a space probe.

Starting off this year are the most gigantic fresh water snail: the Apple Snail. They are native to many tropical and subtropical regions on earth. The ones I collected by the hundreds are from a south Floridian agricultural farm.

Mixed in with the young Apple Snails are shells of mollusks that are over 10,000 years old....these are blanched white and very hardened. These shells got dug up from lower soil levels. They were young and fresh during the last Ice Age (I think...I could do more homework on that)...when this part of Florida was part of a shallow sea bed. Some of the elder mollusks are the same as those I pick up on the seashore. These elder mollusks are salt water varieties and that's different from the Apple Snail shells which are fresh water only.

After a long summer break where most children did not need to wake early to think about things, my Apple Snail shells will open their minds wide...like the tuba-like opening of the giant shells.

Children's drawings and reactions will fill following blogs on this topic.


Meanwhile, look at these links:
 

http://fl.biology.usgs.gov/sofla/apple_snail.pdf

http://www.applesnail.net/

Self-Offense

Video of Krav Maga in the boxing ring


Summer vacation from teaching allowed time to play with my teacher friends at the beach. On route, my girlfriends and I met at a mutually distant shopping center. Planning to use my car since I have the year-long beach sticker, they had snorkel gear and towels to load. Channel 12 News entered the shopping center's parking lot ahead of me. There had been gun-point hold ups at that K-Mart/Publix hub so the News team was an understandable visit.

Preparing for the summer, I bought a bright red bathingsuit. It was the first bathingsuit I bought in 4 years due to the impact the financial disaster 2007 had on me. No pool or beach time for me for 4 years. But I saved up for the beach sticker and shopped carefully for the bathingsuit. Looking for a company that caters to large women and creates feminine designs for them, I found one! 
"Just My Size" http://www.justmysize.com/ uses excellent materials and inventive engineering in their brassieres and bathing suits.
Since the red bathing suit I bought had a pretty flaired shirt, I don't wear other beachwear when going from my house to the sea.

Lynn Gordon, Channel 12 News, West Palm Beach,  saw me and Renee in the K-Mart shopping center and asked us to interview with her regarding the hold-ups at that center. Renee opted out because she was not a resident of the city but I agreed. Realizing I was standing in my red bathingsuit, I did my best to not get embarrassed. Getting close to the age of 60 and yet being willing to wear a red flare bathingsuit meant I had finally outgrown cultural taboos against women.

It was much more important to me to answer Lynn Gordon's good questions than shy away. Her questions were about how to protect ourselves.  I, Teacher ,was back from vacation.

Think about it: one woman Lynn Gordon interview bought pepper spray. Another woman bought a concealed hand-gun kept in her purse. Both tools are ok but not useable in a time frame of having a gun pointed at you. I enrolled in Krav Maga because my first defense if self - offense.

http://www.cbs12.com/news/features/palm-beach-county/stories/vid_348.shtml

The famous comedian, Carol Burnett, was interviewed many years ago. She said the best start to dealing with a perpetrator is to become "the crazy woman". She said this puts the robber off game. I used this technique in New York City when I was accosted at gunpoint. It was the edge I used to stay alive.

Krav Maga's philosophy is that you have the right to your life. This means you have the right to be offensive.

After my 3 introductory lessons, I signed up for membership. I wear the b&w Krav Maga t-shirt now.