Science Education

I've been reading lots of stuff about science education in our schools. Everyone agrees that we need to do "something" to better educate our kids.

Even when speaking with principals at our school about starting a new FIRST team, they told us that they are looking to new ways to educate students, yet still follow the rules of the state. This is becoming a very tough thing to do.

This article from KansasCity.com claims "Education in U.S. must be improved". I'm not sure I totally agree.

Another article by Steven Novella (whom I highly admire) on the NeuroLogica Blog goes into how to teach science. He is a really smart guy and I've enjoyed his insight into science for years. In this article Steven goes into detail about how his daughters are learning science in school, and how he is helping them learn "how science works" at home. This is great and gets to my point.

I think it is the responsibility of the parents to create the desire in their kids to want to learn science. Most kids today don't have the desire to want to learn "how science works" because, frankly, there are lots of cooler things to be doing.

Unfortunately lots of parents aren't seeing the future very clearly. We (the USA) are losing ground when it comes to science and technology. Other countries are teaching their kids that if they learn and have an appetite for success, they'll be able to live in much better conditions then where they grew up. This is a huge motivator in places where the living conditions are not so great.

Our kids continue to play on their Xboxes, PlayStations while updating facebook in their climate controlled paradise. Nobody is seeing the possible future where things could change dramatically.

Think about it. Science education needs to start at home, and it needs to start now.