Random notes

John, just ran across more science materials to look at:
http://www.friendlychemistry.com/ - a couple with ten years of offering this course.
Taking Science to School from the NSF.
Pandia Press'  REAL Science plus History Odyssey.

And I was just reading a fun quaint blogsite.
http://www.freelyeducate.com/

Science Education and the Hubble Telescope

Happy birthday, Hubble!

The Hubble Space Telescope is celebrating its 20th birthday and we have some images taken by the iconic space observatory over the past two decades. Arp 148, shown here, is the staggering aftermath of an encounter between two galaxies, resulting in a ring-shaped galaxy and a long-tailed companion. This image is part of a collection of 59 images of merging galaxies taken by Hubble and released on its 18th anniversary.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36698695/ns/technology_and_science-picture_stories/?GT1=43001

My involvement in the Hubble feels very personal. My Dad was a top management guy at NASA who helped push the Hubble from a concept to a fully-funded priority.  At Dad's funeral, the head of NASA told an annecdote how Dad dealt with some proposed changes and upgrades in the Hubble telescope design after it was fully funded by Congress. Essentially, the engineering team felt that the telescope had some design weaknesses and would benefit from (a very expensive) second set of cameras. The head of NASA said that he wasn't going to go to Congress and ask for it but my Dad could if he wanted. He did, he got it, and Hubble's new cameras actually saved the day and were far more reliable and useful than the original set.  

National Level Science Standards

Science standards at the national level are urgently needed:
http://www.corestandards.org/about-the-standards
They have standards proposed for the Language arts and math area but not so much for other subjects. And their initial work was apparently off-track, way too oriented towards engineering without adequate science.

K-2nd science education looks really cool at Science4Us.com