Want To Review Earth Science?

                  Hello everyone! I would like to say this experience blogging has been an eye-opening one into the cyber world that I had previously been unacquainted with before. I enjoyed the process because it gave me a new perspective and insight from something I believe that can have many positive benefits from. As the semester to Queens College comes to a close and review begins for the New York State Earth Science Regents in June I put together come review on concepts and understandings these students will be tested on.  Below is the link you can click if you would like to review your skills of analyzing and interpreting the Earth Science Reference Table:

Scavenger Hunt!

As always I believe being good in your craft is always pushing yourself to improve your skill. I would really appreciate if you can give me any feedback as I am a first year teacher with a long career ahead of me. 

How Can Students Apply Scientific Terms To Their Own Lives?

   

Hello everyone! This week I would like to post a lab that many of my students took to very well and were able to make connections into their own lives. This particular lab was about permeability and porosity. If you do not remember from your high school years or have not taken this course before, porosity the amount of open pore space in between each sediment and permeability is the ability for water in pass by each sediment. The larger the sediments, the greater the permeability and porosity you are gong to have. The previous blog that I posted had lessons that introduced students to these concepts and had practice thinking about where this occurs and how they can tell the difference. 

Below I have a link that will show you the lab that students completed. Would you be able to answer the summation questions at the end? Follow each procedure correctly? Have an idea of what your doing or what you are trying to see?  Many scholars that I teach come to school with issues you would not believe or can not believe.  Their reality compared to what many other people around the world have are less than ideal but their responses surprised me so much with their insight and overall understanding of this subject matter that I almost cried. Take a look at the lab and let me know if you could distinguish between permeability and porosity. 

Permeability and Porosity Lab

To Teach Water Or Not To Teach Water?

       

                 


              Hello everyone! By now I hope you have realized I am passionate and get excited when I talk about water and my hometown. During my first year as a 10th grade Earth Science teacher in the South Bronx I have spent a lot of time trying to make lessons relevant to the student body and promote critical thinking. Below I have worked many hours to make an objective on water that will open the students mind to the world around them. Please give me feedback on what you think is good, not good and ways I can change to enhance it. Thank you in advance!

Check out my Water Unit

Do Good, Feel Good!

Hello everyone! Every single person living in the coastal areas of the east coast of America knows that it has only been six in half months since Superstorm Sandy hit their homes and businesses. As many people around the world who were not affected by this natural disaster personally have no idea what families are still going through over here-in particular my hometown of Long Beach, NY. So many of my friends and all my family that have lived a very modest and laid back lifestyle are now facing struggles and challenges they never thought they would go through in their entire lives; most are still without homes, necessities and comforts they were used to. But because 'Strong Beach' has a resilient and determined population they are unwilling to pack up and leave the best little beach-town secret that is only 1/2 hour away from the biggest city in the world. One way people are coming together to get back their city they once shared is a project called Pay It Forward. In a nutshell they rebuild lives around the world. This is their mission:

"Our Project has been established to assist in rebuilding the lives, self worth, and the spirit of individuals living in developing nations.  The donations collected from our fundraising efforts will personally be delivered to the neediest individuals, families and organizations.

The money will be put to use in the most economical, culturally appropriate and advantageous way for the recipients, whether it is to help them with their health, livelihoods or education.  The intention being for the recipients to in turn establish and implement grass root programs with the aim of developing self sufficiency(http://www.payitforwardproject.org/page2.html)."

So far every weekend to every other weekend, residents and their children, nephews, nieces, and friends are coming together to work on a business or part of the city to get it back to its original beauty. One business that is close to my heart is a restaurant called Swingbelly's BBQ. During the holiday season they have cooked and made delicious food for the residents of LBC that were without hot food, water, or a friendly face. I actually worked there when they first opened up and let me tell you they have the best mac ' cheese you will ever taste! And the cornbread! and the pulled pork! I can go on and on but they did this out of the kindness of their heart and their love of Long Beach. 

When Pay It Forward sprung up in Long Beach everyone was on board to help out this business. Below I have attached the article with Pay It Forward with Swingbelly's business:

http://longbeach.patch.com/groups/editors-picks/p/project-pay-it-forward

Have you been to Swingbelly's before? What is your favorite dish? I would love to know!

  

Where Does the Water Cycle Begin?

             Last week my 10th grade Earth Science class completed a unit on Hydrology. So far, this has been the one unit students took to the most this year. One of the reasons why scholars did well and came out of it with a deeper understanding of the overall concepts was from their previous introduction to this information. I would like to thank the middle school teacher who brought his/her passion, knowledge, and commitment to each student becuase with him/her I do not know if I would've been as successful as I was during this unit.

   For students that have been absent, tardy, or not enrolled in an Earth Science course can go through these links to get a better understanding of where water is coming from and where it is going. If you believe any of these links are useful or not useable I would love your feedback.

Remember water is not infinite and if we do not prepare ways to conseve water today, tomorrow will come without any!

                                                            YouTube- 'Water Cycle Rap'

                                         Great Page For The Processes Of The Water Wycle

                                               Follow The Drop Through The Water cycle

                                              Where Is The Distribution Of Earth's Water?

                                                           Interaction Water Cycle Site

                                                        Test Yourself With Study Jam

Water- A Given Right Or The Right To Charge Big $?

Hello to my Virtual Friends,
    It has been a few weeks since I last blogged but have been very busy with school, work and life. In one of my graduate classes we are assigned  books to which we read and write a critique. One of the books that is showing some great insight on the issues of our economic times that goes hand in hand with today's society is 'Pedagogy of the Poor: Building the Movement to End Poverty' written by Willie Baptist and Jan Rehmann. The reason I bring this book up is for a few reasons: First, they talk about the issue of poverty and its never-ending cycle which can be useful teaching  Earth Science in a similar area. Second, the book raises the idea that as long as the 'higher-ups' can conquer and divide a group, there will always be a bottom. The third and most important reason to this blog today is that the working-poor classes' communities are having their most fundamental rights threatened by big private firms and companies. While reading these case studies I could not help but get angry at these corporations who think they can just come into a town and make it theirs without the consent of the present families and communities there first. Here is an excerpt from the book'Pedagogy of the Poor':                                                                                                                                            
                                    
                    'In addition to service cuts, a move towards privatization began with the hiring of a former vice president of a privatization consulting firm based in Atlanta to perform the daily administration of the city. He hired a former vice president to run the water department in Highland Park. This new administrator raised the water rates steeply and subcontracted the water department's collection to a private firm, which sent employees carrying firearms to shut of people's water. The city administrator has instituted a policy for adding delinquent water bills to the property tax owed for a home. The city then began to foreclose on homes people who could not pay their water bill. In some cases, children were seized from parents who could not pay their water bill and placed in foster care. Highland Park's new water rates are among the highest rates in the country. It should be no surprise, then, that almost half of Highland Park households have been slated for water shutoff. At the same time, these two administrators were paid $300,000 a year for the part-time work they perform for the financially strapped city (p.87).'
                                             
How did you feel after reading that passage?
What would you do if your town was bought up by a privatization firm and raised your water bills?
Would you move? Stay your ground and fight for what is right?
Would you work for a corrupt firm if they paid you a ridiculous amount of money even though you would be hurting thousands?
                                             

Those are the type of questions that ran through my mind after I read this excerpt. It saddens me that in today's world we are privileged enough to have technology to make our lives easier but all it's really doing is putting people out of work and out of money faster than they are being replenished.  
                                                       
Teaching  the Water Cycle for me used to mean defining words sch as infiltration, evapotranspiration, runoff, condensation, etc. and the idea that it is trying to stay in balance. I know now that it is way more complex than that; I now should be informing my students about the downside of corporations, what they are doing to families like ourselves, and the empowerment to stand up for what they know is right and just. Students need to be aware of what they will be facing in the future and encourage them to do the right thing.
                                            

Erosion-A temporary Bump In The Road?

                 To all of you out there that have been blogging for years or are pros at blogging, this is my first for me. This can be a very intimidating and daunting task for someone who is nervous about posting their personal opinions only to have people read and comment on them! For me I believe that this will be a learning experience that will make me more critical and objective to materials I read and form opinions on.
                 Throughout this blog I will be posting articles and expressing my feelings, beliefs and opinions on science related topics. Also I will be writing  about personal experiences that  have been occurring during my first full time position as an Earth Science teacher in an inner city South Bronx school.

                 The first topic that I would like to discuss is erosion. I taught my students about erosion- its definition, what it does to a stream, and how it afffects their community around them, I wonder if my students grasp the larger picture of what it is doing to every landscape around the globe right now.  Global warming and other human and natural behaviors are increasing the rate of erosion in many places. Because earth is constantly trying to maintain homeostasis I will not get into areas, landscapes, and ecosystems that are experiencing an abundance of deposition but stick to those areas that are being impacted by erosion.
               Growing up on a beach in a bathing suit down on the south shore in a small tight knit community of Long Beach I remember playing Red Rover in the back of the beach, body surfing in the shore breaks of the Atlantic Ocean and digging holes to try and reach China. I look back at those days and can really only remember great times with my family, friends, and the warm sun.
               In October 2012 Long Beach experienced not only the worst tropical storm that ever hit the city, but now are faced with a serious dilemma-beach eroison. During the storm surge the water not only went above the 10 foot dunes(a natural barrier consisting of large mounds of sand and vegetation), but also engulfed them out to sea and into the homes of residents and streets throughout the island.

          Many of my family members and friends, including myself, were left with homes under water and nowhere to go. While many of them are in the process of renovating their basements and first floors, a lot of questions have been going through my mind as to what is going to happen in the future. Some questions that I would appreciate comments on is:
       -When is the boardwalk that consisted of the dunes underneath going to be built again? How long is that going to take?
       -What are families going to do to prevent their homes from flooding again?
       -Should everyone sell their homes and move inland?
       - How long is it going to take the city to rebuild all the homes, restaurants and stores back to its original form? Is this even possible?
       -What are insurance companies and the government doing about this natural disaster?

      Those are just some of my thoughts about this Earth Science topic that I believe is extremely interesting and extremely real!