I'm No Scientist

David Wescott is a brilliant man.(And, no, I was not paid to type those words.)

I first met David when I went on a blog trip to tour the GlaxoSmithKline vaccine manufacture plant. He was the main point of contact and I found myself thinking about things in a new light after hearing some of his opinions.  I'm a fairly opinionated, strongly social person - but get me out of my areas of comfort and I have no idea what to say. As a result, I frequently sound either a) uninformed b) unintelligent or c) unintelligible.

This past week, he created a new bloggy carnival type event called #scimoms.

He explains his idea much more succinctly than I ever would, so please forgive the large snip:

Online moms have extraordinary power – far more than most people realize. Companies listen to them. Policy makers listen to them. Moms make the overwhelming majority of decisions in life – what to buy, who to vote for, when to get health care, and so on. They do most of the work. They do most of the child-rearing. They're the boss. The problem is a lot of online moms feel labeled, disrespected, and misunderstood.

Science bloggers push the boundaries of ideas.  They give us facts, and theories, and great stories about discovery.  They celebrate the pursuit of knowledge and help us understand all kinds of important things.

Oh, crud. Just go over and read the entire thing already. It's amazing. 

I'm not a scientific person at all. The only real science type stuff I do is baking - and I hardly think that qualifies.

 My son loves Legos, though, and his school recently began a Lego club, taught by an amazing woman who is a high school physics instructor with an undergrad in Physics and a Masters in Computer Science, who works as a software engineer and analyst.

 Dude. Just typing that sentence makes me feel SO STUPID.

I haven't been able to give my children a love for science from me, but I'm determined that if they like it - and at least two of my children do - I'm going to encourage it.

Believe it or not, Lego club does this. They learn STEAM - Science, Technology, Engineering, and Applied Math through technology. I'm a big believer in hands on learning and learning through play - and it's paid off here. Gabe has started discussing physics and mathmatical equations that I didn't know he even understood.

Have a science story to share? Write a post on it and link it up on David's site, and leave it on twitter with the hashtag #scimoms. I'm supposed to tag people to write on this, but I'm no fan of tagging - I always leave someone out and I don't want to hurt anyone.

Comments

[CM Doran]

Thanks for writing. I too am a mom [only 5], but also a pharmacist with research background--used to feel like a scientist. Now I write--science/medicine stuff--the worlds collide--sometimes not peacefully. I very much appreciate your humor! excellent. All people that care about learning can work together, and I will follow you. I'm also figuring out in my head my #scimom post

[Sylvia]

Baking is most certainly a science and one I FAIL at on a regular basis. Interesting post though. I like being able to come to your site and learn something new.

[Sarah in Ottawa]

Carmen, my BSc and MSc are in Food Science - Chemistry, Microbiology and Engineering related to all-things food. And my dear, baking is most definitely a scientific endeavour.

[Katie]

Shameless plug here but have the teacher check out http://4hset.unl.edu/4hdrupal/

I work for the University of Nebraska Lincoln and used to work on this project...lots of lessons and LEGO challenges!