Learning and Science

Gerardo Lazaro is hyperthinking...

2011-03-12T12:42:00.001-05:00

It has been a great ride since I started using technology in teaching in 2008. After a few months, I introduced myself to the universe of technology and its potentisal uses for education, communications and life in general.
However, something that I didn't realize until a few months ago, is that while I speak to friends and people in general, one of those moments that usually happen in your living room, and we're discussing about any topic, I constantly have hyperthoughts. What is hyperthinking? I'm not sure that's a valid word, but it's the best I can use to explain that everytime I'm thinking I'm having a series of hyperlink activity in my brain. I hear something about Peru, and I imagine the latest YouTube video about it. If I hear about psychology, then I share that there's a great course in iTunes that is free and available to anybody, and so on, and so on.
Is that a consequence? Or, is it part of the phenomenon that prompted me to use media and internet resources in general?
Is our brain getting used to think in terms of hyperlinks?
help me answer these questions and let me know if you go thorugh the same process, or is it about time to call the nearest psychiatrist?

Reengineering the search engines...a must in the era of overwhelming information

2011-03-12T12:10:00.002-05:00

It is completely overwhelming to be immersed in the technological world and deal with the astoundingly growing amount of information that is available nowadays. As a heavy information user, I find myself swimming in this sea of data (text, images, videos, blog posts, podcasts,etc), and most of the time I spend while searching the resources I want to incliude in my classses is filtering among the search results from the different seach engines I use according to the nature of queries.
I have come up to summariza search engines depending on their specialty. Even though using multiple and specialized search engines is a great help, it has always been an incomplete experience.
I just enjoyed what is the new experience of search engines mixed up with a spreadsheet feeling of information classification.

Google Squared is one of the new services Google is offering for those of us who enjoy browsing through the vast oceans of information.
It gives you a new dynamic process when searching ands classifying your information. It certainly reduces your searching time and extends your options. You can add criteria by adding columns to enrich your search results.
I encourage you to incorporate it into your searching experience. Take a look at the following video:

Here are some of the search engines I use and recommend:

METASEARCH Engines:
www.mamma.com
www.dogpile.com
www.ixquick.com
www.webcrawler.com
www.izito.com
www.faganfinder.com

IMAGE Search Engines:
www.compfight.com
www.taggalaxy.com (Great to be used with an interactive whiteboard)
www.tineye.com
http://elzr.com/imagery
www.pixsy.com

OTHER Search Engines:
www.soople.com (Easy expert search)
http://4me.sweetsearch.com/ (Sweet search 4 me)
www.ipl.org (Libraries' search engine)
www.rollyo.com (Customizable search engine)
www.blackle.com (Energy-saver search engine powered by Google)
www.2lingual.com (Bilingual Search engine)

I hope these search engines are of good use for you as a teacher or internet user.
If you have additional search engines, please contribute and post a comment.

This is an addition to the organization search engines can give you. I want to include Google Wonderwheel. It is a very graphic way to organize the information you're searching. I recommend you the post from Alan Simpson's blog, One year in the life of an English teacher. Here one of the images he used:

New approach to technology for children

2011-02-13T14:54:00.001-05:00

I was very fortunate to participate in yesterday's VII International Seminary "Digital Brain". It happened in Lima, Peru and it was organized by Cerebrum (Neuroscience, Education and Human Development) a very active and renowned organization in charge of spreading knowledge and best educational practices based on neuroscience, pedagogy and psychology investigations. There were two speakers, Anna Lucia Campos and Gary Small, MD (www.drgarysmall.com), a world renowned neuroscientist with lots of publications on topics such as: nuerology, psychiatry, memory, brain and Alzheimer Disease.

During their presentations lots of interesting facts, investigations and proposals were considered. the best of all is that it changed the way I think about exposing young children to technology and the newest gadgets. For some of the comments from the presentations follow the hashtags: #CerebroDigital and #DigitalBrain in Twitter, or go to Cerebrum's twitter account: http://twitter.com/cerebrumdigital.

Even more by the fact that I saw some of Sugata Mitra's videos and investigations to ask myself a question: Should we radically change the way we teach and expose children to technology?

Take a few minutes by watching these videos, and help me answer that question:

Sugata Mitra shows how kids teach themselves

Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education

http://goo.gl/THJYL

Learning in the present, and near future

2010-12-23T08:10:00.001-05:00

A few days ago I had to give my last presentation at my MEd class. It was a great experience. Not only because it marked the end of a very important step in my professional development, but also because it was achieving a 2-year program that had to fit into a very busy schedule.
In terms of learning I had a great deal of it, personally and as a member of a great group of professionals of different areas (interpreter/translator, librarian, teachers, dentists, police men, linguist, lawyer, graphic designer, and me, a biologist turned educator). The perspective to see many things was very rich coming from such a diverse group.
My last presentation was about the education in the future, in order to prepare for that I had to review a large amount of information from the past and try to set one of the possible scenarios for the near future of education, I don't think anybody can accurately predict the long term future of education, changes are too rapid and technologically strong to predict something for more than 15 years.
It was undeniable for me to foresee, as many others have done that the way we assess and evaluate students will not serve a real purpose in the long run. We´ve been assessing students' knowledge based on the amount of information they can remember. That might have been useful before, but nowadays anybody with internet access can have access to almost infinite amounts of information. Definetely, that is not the ideal way we want to make sure we're educating our students right. It is not how much information they may remember or memorize, it is what they can learn, create or produce from it that really matters.

The following video is a great way to see that, it is an experience called I Scientist in the UK:

I Scientist film from Storymakers TV on Vimeo.

The following video speaks for itself, let's democratize education and have mistakes being a part of the learning process.

These are some of the words I could type in my iPod while I was reading about learning theories and i think it's useful for my thesis that tries to link use of technology with learning strategies:
Education in the 21st century must not be restricted to theoretical and abstract knowledge acquisition. It is imperative to put even more emphasis in skills that promote obtaining, selecting and analysis of large quantities of information in short periods of time.
Learning must be active in the sense that any learner must have the capacity to take informed but fast decisions based on vast amounts of information presented in different formats, in order to produce analytical comments and recommendations presented in visually-frienly and attractive formats.
Learning must be based on training of skills on the move, and the evaluation methods must be modified from assessing the amount of processes in what Vigoysky calls, the Zone of Real Development, and the Zone of Proximal Development. This is of great importance due to the fact that the amount of information available to anybody with Internet access is practically infinite. It would be counterproductive to pretend that society can determine the professionalism of a person, or the academic or developmental potential of an individual based solely on the amount of knowledge already acquired, instead of the potential production and creative solutions that individuals can provide if learning skills are directed and trained.
These skills are hardly obtained if the student is left untrained. And it is in this part where today's students are found in significant amounts. The economic constraints in developing countries imposed by superficial needs to follow the lifestyle of developed countries, obliges parents to maintain more than one job at the same time, leaving young students (teenagers) at the will of mass communication media and their own to overcome the academic exigencies imposed by public and private schools.
Once these young students are left alone or minimally supervised at home, they are prone to the actions of a massive avalanche of information that demands the information user to be developmentally mature, a blending between the concrete and abstract operational stages described by the famous psychologist Jean Piaget decades ago.
It is the formation of the personality, organizational skills and academic goals,or their absence what will determine the perspective and desire of learning for the future life of young students.
The essential skills to be developed have to cover these gaps of parental attention and circumstancial solitude facing the academic demands. Cognitive and metacognitive skills, in that order take years of academic training, usually obtained in the years spent in higher education. However, the cultural, economic and technological demands require education to be oriented towards the formation of an individual with order, positive attitude and ambitious goals supported by a solid academic basis.
Based on Vigotsky's theory, the proximal area of development is the area that 21st century education must concentrate its efforts, because it is now impossible to sum up information and knowledge as could be done only a few decades ago. The amount of information is doubling in less than 5 years already, this infinite amount of information could not be acquired using traditional educational methods, mostly based on memorization and classic repetition of information. It is the intense training of cognitive and metacognitive skills in conjuction with clear practical applications to what is being learned, bringing real-life applications to my class and out of it.

Dealing with Technology and Education

2010-11-16T19:12:00.000-05:00

I've been very quiet with this blog in the last few months. I've been very busy between school work, BEd program, MEd program, family and others. However, there's always time for dealing with technology and education. I'm still working on designing a suitable questionnaire to be used with high school students and first-year college students based on their technology use and how that might have changed their learning strategies and academic performance, any help is well appreciated. Indeed, I commented this with Silvia Tolisano, and she suggested that I should request help via twitter and my PLN. It's a great idea, because I might be able to have students from other countries take my standardized learning styles test and my technology insertion questionnaire.
One of the things that keeps me alive in education and technology, is the firm belief that the future is our present and dealing with new generations and even harder, educating them to solve yet unknown problems in globalized environments is very difficult. But nothing is impossible, especially when creativity kicks in.
My education and creativity guru is Sir Ken Robinson. I saw his RSA Award receiving speech video about a month ago, it's a short animated video (little over 11 minutes). The animation significantly enhances the already remarkable message about Changing the Education Paradigms.
There's nothing more important than keeping fresh in our minds, why and how we are educating people.
Take a look at the animated and original videos:

RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms

Original Receiving Speech

In his last book, Sir Ken Robinson writes about The Element, which is the inspirational and creative passion that makes us what we are, or what we would like to be. I recommend you to read it, you'll certainly enjoy the life experiences depicted there.

Global revolution...ing

2010-10-16T01:59:00.000-05:00

How many times in your life can you say that you've been part of a global revolution? Not many, I would assume, or perhaps a lot, depending on which revolution you think i'm writing about. There are indeed many revolutions happening right now. Some can be summed up in Technology (Information, Communication), others in Science (Biology, Medicine), but all of them should have a commanding force: Education.

I read news, reports, journals and so on about Biology, Education, Technology and Culture in general, and every single day I get enough adrenaline to continue form one more year.

I regularly watch TED lectures, and there are two speakers that are my favorites: Sir Ken Robinson and Juan Enriquez, not only because they tell us the stories and things we must listen to and work on, but also because they speak from their hearts and minds with passion and humor.

This morning I watched 2007's Juan Enriquez wants to grow Energy, and agriculture was the centralized topic.

I have just finished watching 2010 Sir Ken Robinson's Bring on the learning revolution!, and again there was a central reference to agriculture, and this reference was metaphorically essential. We need to grow education, water students with appropriate learning environments, and harvest life-long learners eager to act on their and our world's problems to arise.

I dream about doing things better in my life, family and work, the beauty of being an educator is that even though we can make mistakes, we can offer knowledge and opportunities to students, and have a larger impact in other people's lives.

I am in the middle of revolutionary times, and so are you, I'll try my best, but if you are a student you have to at least match that effort. And yes, you can do it.

Sustainability

2010-08-22T12:56:00.000-05:00

I participated in the organization of the Latin American Heads Conference (LAHC) Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Conference in Lima, Peru. This conference became something real with teachers and students participating in this event. It is so rewarding to see something materialize from paper to actions.
This conference talked about many things, but the main theme and drive was to promote concrete actions for schools in Lima, Peru regarding a very important issue, educating our student with a Sustainable Development approach, perspective and creed. After all, doing that will help us take good care of our planet by consuming Fair Trade products, raise community awareness, organize and participate in students' activities, and overall, be responsible with ourselves and our planet.
You can find more information about this conference and the informatiuon that was made available through its wiki, click here.
Fair Trade is the approach to business by doing things in a sustainable way, better wages, giving things back to the community, which promotes further development and increases the production and helps businesses grow by taking good care of the planet. Find out more about fair trade from: Wikipedia, Fair Trade Foundation (UK), Fair trade Labelling Organizations International (FLO), Fair Trade Federation (US), and review some good examples of TransFair (US).

One of the impacting messages I took from this conference is to be aware of the products I and most of us consume. I'll follow this post with another one about Green Chemistry, but take the time to visit a very interesting website, The Story of Stuff, where you can watch Annie Leonard.

The best of all is that The Story of Stuff will help students raise awareness in their immediate community, and for us teachers, we'll be able to use their resources for teaching this and other lessons.

Internationalism

2010-04-19T16:30:00.001-05:00

How diverse and multicultural is your country? Shouldn't education aim to form Global Citizens?
How much of it is based on Cultural Competence and Tolerance?
Can I type ablog post solely on questions? How Web 1.0 is that?
The only different, is that I'm typing it from an iPod Touch using free wifi.

Blogging in a busy 21st Century World

2010-04-13T23:04:00.004-05:00

I love blogging, although my concept of it has changed over time. I've always been a fan of writing properly. My humble experience tells me that if the text is not interesting enough in the first 3 lines, then your post will most likely be browsed...so my 4th line will mention the new assignment I gave to my 9th grade students. It is about Geologic Eras, Origin of Species and Evolution.
How impressive it is to analyze time from the geologic point of view, it just makes us remember that our lifetime is nothing more than a tiny speck in a huge field.
I'm also a fan of scientific literature, so I've given them the good news, they'll read 4 books with me this year: The Microbe Hunters (Paul De Kruif), The Naked Ape (Desmond Morris), The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins), and I'm still debating for a 4th one, suggestions are appreciated.
In the meantime, I'll leave you with the video: "Eleanor Morgan says we evolved from Aquatic Apes"

People and Devices: Online 24/7

2010-01-25T12:33:00.002-05:00

Every single day, 350+ million users access Facebook, a slightly less number of users communicate by 140-character messages via Twitter, and others exchange info, feelings and messages via hi5, MySpace, MSN Messenger, etc.

It is easy to understand the explosion in Social Media in the last few years, Communication is innate and inherent to humans, and language is its highest expression, and humans have perfected it.

I started on Twitter last year, and ever since I’ve tweeted over a thousand times, and for sure I’ve read over 100,000 tweets already. Growing in Social Media is as exponential as bacterial growth, unstoppable.

Demographics depend on the type of Social Media you are inquiring about, but in general terms most internet users have experienced it in one way or another.

However, one thing is certain, kids love social media, and they are the fastest growing demographic group showing presence in these websites. So, how does that translate into something to be used in education?

Well, it is necessary to be able to get into Social Media as well, as teachers and administrators, we must be facilitators (unintended rhyme) and not scared away from it, and less of all…forbid it.

Digital Natives are anew generation, and as much as we want to categorize them as ADD or ADHD kids, they are multitaskers. I’m sure there will be a significant change in appreciation in the still valid idea that women are true and efficient multi-taskers, and men aren’t. In the near future, kids and teens will have to be occupying that perception.

How’s the behavior of our kids’ and teens’ right now? We can certainly verify it by watching this video and identifying our son, daughter, niece or nephew:

M(2) Video

The report published by the Kaiser Family Foundation, indicates numbers that are completely true. Usage of media has increased to 10 hours and 29 minutes in 2009, discounting the multi-tasking time (29%) we reach to 7 hours and 38 minutes a day.

So, kids are “working” a whole shift in total media (Tv, internet, music, games, etc.) Wouldn’t it be productive for teachers to insert knowledge acquisition and learning enhancement activities in such shift?

What does that indicate? We have to adapt! Adaptation is a human characteristic, and one that we need to use a lot in this case.

How will be the Web of Tomorrow? Simple answers: more portable, smaller, easier to use, ubiquitous, and easier to integrate to any of our daily devices and appliances.

I always go back to Sir Ken Robinson and his TED conference when dealing with questions about Education, and this time is not the exception. Creativity in Education is something we must constantly go back to as a reference point, but also as a stimulus for learners and teachers.

eReading, WiFi Pedestrian

2010-01-22T09:30:00.001-05:00

I’ve been downloading several iTunes files to learn about Psychology (Yale 1, 2), or American History, or even learn how to make iPhone Apps. This is a trend that has been followed by many universities already.

It is undeniable that our life has been molded towards mobile gadgetry. My 6 yo son complains when I change his movie trailers from the iPod, and sometimes enjoys listening to Paul Bloom lecturing about Psychology.

So, that makes me think that in the 5 years we could be seeing at highly innovative new products, but I’m sure we’ll updated versions of the current, still “new” products.

The iPhone will probably be updated to its 4G version on the Apple event on January 27th, and the iTablet launched, as well as presenting the iLife 2010. The excitement that Apple creates in the tech biz is incredible, every other year all of us are waiting to see the novelties from Steve Jobs’ company.

The eBook readers is another of those devices that are hot these days. However, a close look to the Kindle brought some points to consider, for example, when is the color Kindle coming out? A report last year indicated that by August 2009 the 3rd version could have it, but it is the end of January 2010 and is not here yet.

What will come next then? Will we track our children’s location with subdermal GPS devices? Will the refrigerator in your kitchen remind you of today’s To-Do list while it sends the shopping list to the local market?

What comes next? What is in the future of mobile and technology devices for our kids?

Global Warming…or, Global Raining?

2010-01-09T09:58:00.003-05:00

I’ve been hearing about the issues of Global Warming for years. Causes and consequences have shifted in some way over the years. Many are the reasons for that, certainly the world’s needs are sometimes a drive force to modify some of these issues. Carbon dioxide, greenhouse effect, oil, methane, and other terms have been in our mouths for years. Nothing has been significantly done government-wide in the US, more than separate actions that have have little or no effect nationwide, not a good move considering that the US populations represents 4% of the world population but contributes with 25% of the World Carbon dioxide emissions.

I’m talking about this because I woke up at 5 am with water dripping from the roof of my apartment due to “intense” rain for Lima, PERU. Since I came back to my home country, I have witnessed more rain in the last 3 years than during my first 25 years here.

Click here for the news report.

I call it “intense” because 3-4 cm in the city of Lima is a significant problem, the city is not prepared for rain. In fact, floods all over the city were registered yesterday, disrupting transportation and bringing down mud and houses.

How can an old bureaucratic city with a corrupt government prepare for mother nature’s fluctuating weather conditions? That is something that must be answered not only in my country but everywhere. The difference with northern or european countries is that they have had more extreme weather regularly and they are prepared, but we’re not.

If problems come from extreme weather and unpredictability, what’s better than mother nature to help us solve those problems. I review TED talks constantly, and these two lectures might be of interest for this topic:

www.asknature.org

2010…Resolute

2009-12-31T08:57:00.002-05:00

2010 is a year of hopes, more than the current one. I don’t remember most of my expectations this same day a year before, I’m sure they were important but I just can’t remember them. The only one I remember is that I wanted to go back to university, as a student.

On March, I started a BEd and an MEd, both programs separately in the same university, URP in Lima, Peru. I had started the same MEd a in 2008, but for personal reasons it remained inconclusive. I had had a taste of it and I wanted it back. I did my best even though I thought it wasn’t going to be possible to carry on both programs, 50+ hours of work a week, a wife and two kids.

I guess I was lucky and fortunate at the same time. My family has been a tremendous incentive in my new educational stage. My two kids know when I’ll get home late, and they come to the lab and visit me during their recess time, I work at the school where they study. that gave me a different connection, something that didn’t happen before. We talk about the university classes, and I included them in one of my last presentations when i prepared a video of a moment of creativity.

One of them is more into the plastic arts, the other is more into high tech. He downloads games, and chats since he was 5. He handles electronic devices by intuition and my wife requires his assistance to change the ring tone of her cell phone. Does that sound familiar? Digital Native vs Digital immigrant?

We were planning to go camping for 4 days to celebrate the new year, but my friend (the organizer) had to be taken to the ER due to intense chest pain. He was diagnosed with Angina Pectoris, a sign that you might get a heart attack (Click here to see an animation). I saw him yesterday after staying overnight in the ER. He has to take it slow, and so do I. Apart from the fact that the camping with the kids had to be rearranged, it made me think very seriously about myself.

I’ll turn 35 by the end of February, I’ve had that number in my mind for quite some time. That is the mark where I was supposed to start living a serious and organized healthy lifestyle. I guess I’ll have to stick to that deadline, because I don’t want the dead line.

For the rest, I’m very compromised to finish university and pursue a new turn in my career, and the events for the coming year will tell in what direction that turn will be.

Happy New 2010!

Scientific Week

2009-11-15T20:00:00.001-05:00

I read yesterday about crashes in the Moon causing water from the Moon rise to the surface. This along is a great discovery, water has always been the main search engine of life in places other than Earth. Who knows what else is on or under the Moon’s surface. Let’s not forget that the Moon was part of our planet sometime around the first forms of life appeared. There’s always room for speculation.

However, I just read something else that sounded very interesting too. Is Teleportation possible? it appears to be, although only for one atom. Nothing shy of impressive and amazing, certainly. I’m not a big fan of tv shows such as Star Trek or others that considered teleportation as a futuristic possibility. However, this report has been a great start, and the computer industry might grab the idea and its potential before the travel industry, that’s for sure.

Podcasting in 6th Grade

2009-11-09T13:12:00.001-05:00

I wonder how I would have reacted if my 6th grade Science teacher, Mr. Torres (I think), gave me the chance to participate in a real-time video conference with students half a continent away.

That’s exactly what we did today in class. My 6th grade students from St. George’s College in Lima-Peru, have participated in a video conference, which is not new, but they will start working together with Chelsy Hooper from Ensworth school in Nashville, TN.

They greeted each other and exchanged brief questions and comments, to finally agree on working together in podcasts about forces and motion, and bacteria and viruses.

I’ll let you know of the results as soon as we have the audio ready and published in the collaborative wiki.

Interactive Porfolios

2009-11-01T10:07:00.001-05:00

Not even 20 years, when I was a high school student, the use of the notebook was imperative. Notebooks with squares, lines, double lines, etc. Writing, re-writing, using pens in different colors, drawing and more, were regular activities during my school life. I’m sure that millions of students in most parts of the world did the same. We were all used to work that way.In 1991, during my senior year in high school, the Internet was not known in my area. It was only a couple of years later that the Web started its rampant popularity.

Notebooks continue being a significant part of today’s education system. It is undeniable the importance of notebook when kids learn to write. However, a question comes to my mind, how much do we write as adults nowadays? I thought about this last semester when I went back to University to get my MEd and I had to answer an extensive test. My hand became sore after a few minutes, at that point I realized that I hadn’t hand-written so much in years.

I reformulate my previous question, is it necessary to push kids' to have the perfect hand-writing style if they’ll quit it very early in life? As I said at the beginning, it is undenniable that learning hand-writing at an early age is a necessity, but as long as kids write clearly, should we keep pushing them?

I prepare all my classes using the Notebook software for SMART Board (Interactive Whiteboard), ironic right? And all theses classes are published in my wiki and available to be downloaded at anytime by my students or any person in the world. So, why should they keep using a regular paper notebook?

The immediate answer is because they should be able to take notes in class from the discussions we have about Science topics and the information that is not included in the class files, also supplementing it with additional information, following a constructivist model to build up knowledge and contributing in their own education. As an adult student, it is something implicit for me. However, in school, the implicit is not always evident or practiced.

My classes requested students to work on their paper notebooks the same way. But the results I obtained were not the best. So if the paper notebook as a working or evaluation tool lost its purpose. So, I decided to replace it with something new.

Thinking and browsing information, I found a concept that I liked, Notebooks as Interactive Portfolios. Making a notebook as if it was a web page, a blog, or as Web 2.0 page.

It is kind of difficult to do it on paper, but my first assignment obtained a siginificant gfood response from students. it was going from the darkness of paper notebooks, to the enlightment of Interactive Portfolios, or iPortfolios.

As a necessary activity, I’m planning to request it on a regular basis, but without pushing them.

I have designed a format following the sides of the brain, a “classic” left side with analytical parts, and an “Interactive” right side, where creativity and audiovisual aspects are key.

Here are some examples that I found and the formats that I created:

Debating in the 21st Century

2009-10-14T15:28:00.001-05:00

Travel and lodging costs are being replaced by teleconfrences, and lately by videoconferences. That’s something that we had been used to hear from the business world. And even though they have developed that to create software to supply the demands of today’s globalized world.

However, the technology development and its applicability is being very well used and exploited in Education. Because it’s free, or very low cost, it’s entertaining and the demands of the audience are as current as they can be. Today’s students as defined by Marc Prensky, are Digital Natives, and we, today’s teachers will aspire only to be Digital Immigrants.

I typically organize debates, group discussions and other teaching-learning strategies. However, it was my desire to organize a bilingual debate between students from different parts of the world.

I’m working on that, and I wanted to share my first experience. I had a Class Discussion between my 8th grade students in Colegio San Jorge de Miraflores in Lima-PERU and 9th grade students from Hunterdon High School, a school in New Jersey-USA. Parents and students gladly received the idea and the possibility of expansion and use of 21st century skills bringing down language and distance barriers, to accomplish speaking in different languages and with people from other realities.

That was the case last week, and even though it was a short discussion, we could only stay connected for 30 minutes, it was the first out a series of discussions to be done for the rest of they year. US students practiced their Spanish and discussion skills, and Peruvian students tested their English and discussion skills as well. While they were talking there was a simultaneous webcast camera broadcasting in this channel.

The topic in discussion helped me introduce them into the biology class of Human Reproductive System, it was: do you agree with natural conception only? Or, assisted reproductive techniques as well?

My special thanks to Jon Pennington who coordinated the event from the NJ side. Here is a little sample of that:

Perhaps in 10 years we will see the first generations of digital native teachers facing the challenges of the new generaltions of digital natives. How will they be called at that time, Digital Innates?

Creativity

2009-09-16T00:58:00.000-05:00

I've been working in education all my life, and I didn't notice it until I became a teacher. A few months ago, I heard something that gave me professional peace, I felt selfish until that moment, benefiting from educating others while I was learning in the process. "Turning Learning Right Side Up: Putting Education Back on Track", is the title of a book written by Russell Ackoff and Daniel Greenberg, I haven't read the book yet, but I listened to a synopsis via podcast. The book is in my wish list in Amazon, so the next relative coming from the US will bring me a copy of it.
What I rescue more of it is the motto: "The Objective of Education is Learning, not Teaching". no I don't feel as selfish for learning as much, or more, than my own students through my process of teaching.

Open publication - Free publishing - More teaching

I've been preparing a lecture on creativity and Joy Paul Guilford's work on the Structure of Intellect and his 3 layered cube, and while preparing it, I've learned a great deal of expertise, creativity is incredible and so magnificent that we must turn to mother nature before we can do something creative.
I found a countless number of extraordinary TED talks about Creativity, here are some of the few ones that made me feel that I want to create something:

It took me 10 years

2009-08-23T21:08:00.001-05:00

I finished my biology degree in december 1997 in UPCH in Lima, Peru. A few months later, I started working as an Embryologist in a local fertility clinic. I might have somebody from the other world with a good soul overseeing me, because I’ve felt that in more than occasion that “at the right time and at the right place” situations were there for me.

After a couple months as an apprentice, I was sent to Santiago-Chile to be trained in a top practice by the best people in South america. I was certainly fortunate, and I learned a lot. In the following two years I went on a training tour that took me to places like: La Serena, Viña del Mar, Cartagena de Indias, Buenos Aires, Mexico DF, and Caracas.

After working 3 years in Peru, I decided to move the USA, I was hired by the largest Pennsylvania Health System, and spent 4 years working there as an Embryologist for 4 years.

Working in an IVF lab gives you ann incredible vision of reproductive health and all its low- and high-complexity procedures. Even though is just an expression, sometimes I felt the power of creating life with my hands. It was a very rewarding experience, to help thousands of people achieve the purpose of life, to create new life.

Before I finished working as a lab rat, I started turning my eyes and my interest to a new activity. Medical Interpreting captured my attention and I began training. After a 30-day class, I was invited to participate in the first 2nd stage training provided for Medical Interpreters in Philadelphia, and I was certainly the youngest and, by far the least experienced. I hadn’t been in the field yet. But I felt deeply challenged and I rose to the occasion.

After finishing my job as an Embryologist, I started volunteering in a company that provided training and experience in the interpreting and cultural competence fields, as well as participating in the training of new Medical Interpreters.

I gotta say that it might have been the most challenging and rewarding experience of life, learning astounding life and death experiences in the best children’s hospital in the US, and one of the top three in the world, perhaps the best place a person can work in.

It was during that time when I started experiencing Education. I had to come back to my country because I didn’t want to put me and my family in an unsafe situation remaining in the US after my H1B had expired.

That gave me the opportunity to rethink my professional activity, and started working as an educator in a bilingual school in Lima, Peru. After 6 months working there I decided to work in a another bilingual school, from there on a turn in my career had occurred.

Being part of the Education System brought new challenges that I’m trying to accomplish now by preparing myself in a Teacher Certification Program to obtain a Teaching License, and a Masters in Higher Education.

It took me 10 years to trace some of traveling steps back. In November 2008, I was invited to offer a workshop in the “ICT for Teaching & Learning Creatively” in Rio de Janeiro. From there, I was also invited to Bogota, Colombia to launch the first social network from the LAHC at their 13th Annual Meeting, it was in that meeting that I received an invitation to participate as a trainer and lecturer in Buenos Aires, Argentina, from where I just came back today.

All these experiences made me think of my professional career so far. In 10 years, I have managed to help babies be born (Embryologist), then I helped them with their health care (Interpreter), and now I’m educating them (bilingual teacher). I guess the natural progression is to continue in the post-secondary education, perhaps the post-graduate degree will help me in that unplanned progression.

Global Communication

2009-08-14T21:18:00.001-05:00

Several months ago I recieved an email from somebody, the message included a link to a geek test. I took it, out of curiosity. It turns out I didn’t qualify as a real geek, even though I spend several hours a day in front of a computer. But I guess being a computer geek is more a lifestyle that a job description. Although if we watch the british sitcom The IT Crowd, everything mingles into a crazy success on unreal events and situations, funny for sure.

I mention this because I get many comments from people expressing their concern for how “youth is becoming less and less communicative and deepened in computers”. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I can accept that over the last decades most people tend to work out less or even walk, but less communicative, I don’t think that is true.

I can say this because it seems to me that lots of people are very reluctant to big changes, and considering the fact that global changes can happen in a matter of minutes via YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and many more internet resources.

Since I started working very actively in my school’s ICT Area, I have met lots of people online. Ok, I know, that’s one of the major criticisms and jokes from people with over 10,000 friends in Facebook; but the important part of this is that getting to know my professional contacts online has allowed to meet some of them personally, even though I’m on the opposite side of the continent, bringing new possibilities of collaborative projects, exchange of learning experiences and sharing culturally-competent activities.

My contacts, besides family and friends, are almost all professional contacts. These people help me get information, process it and discuss it so I’m able to learn many new things.

Anyway, I’m glad that distances, are virtual, and virtually tiny, because VOIP, video conferences and else, help us reduce distances, time and costs. Important ingredients in any professional stting or business area.

How could I teach my students about technological impact on education if I am not a clear example that learning through global connections is not possible, but necessary nowadays.

Let’s take a look at an interesting journey to technological possibilities in the future, the merchantilistic view is impressive, although hollow.

Technology to meet people

2009-07-05T20:37:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago I received an email from a teacher from the US, her name is Alecia Berman-Dry, she was requesting help to contact schools in Cusco,Peru to connect and carry out social projects, she's a member of World Leadership School, an association that promotes these projects in different parts of the world.
I constantly hear from people that are not tech-driven, that using computers takes people away from "real" friendships and contact with people. I truly find hard to believe that such opinion can be given, and the only reason that comes to my mind is that those people do not embrace new ways to communicate, those ways that eliminate time differences, language barriers and geographical distances.
Alecia and I had a great meeting until an hour ago, agreeing on a series of projects to engage our students in collaborative work, because the real world works through collaboration, and if not, it should.
Looking forward to get more of those connections.

Classroom Access

2009-05-21T18:43:00.003-05:00

Image via Wikipedia

I've been trying to obtain permission, budget and quorum to start a pilot on using laptops in the classroom. Even though laptops are part of an expansion plan for the Technological Innovation Program in my school, I think my 8th grade students are ready. We're starting a double Voicethread project this week, to answer teachers in Cincinnati and New York. We're doing videos to show the evolution of education, we´re starting a twitter project, etc.
However, I got a comment in one of my Issuu documents from Peter Hill (Australia) that threw me off. He informed me of a nationwide project to implement laptops for 9th graders and up, supported by his government. That's some major project, 267,00 laptops for senior students and teachers.
Different countries have different policies in education, but the most successful countries in this area are the ones that invest the most in their nation's most important human capital, students.
Initiatives like the one from Australia's premier, Nathan Rees is something to remark.
I would be delighted to see that my country's government starts an initiative with at least 50% that initiative. After all, money in education is always well invested.

Interactive Classrooms

2009-04-13T22:55:00.005-05:00

I finished my lecture about Interactive Classrooms and that made me think a lot. How much has my teaching style changed in the last 12 months?
A year ago, I recall using the SMART Board only. But that took me to the Web 2.0 world. From there on it was all a snowball reaction: bloglines, gmail, delicious, reader, blogger, wikispaces, twitter, tweetdeck, etc, etc.
My students are far more technologically driven and demanding than 12 months ago. However, there is something that Sir Ken Robinson said in a 2006 TED conference, "Are schools killing creativity?". Believe me, I fight with that thought everytime I start a class. My hope is to engage students in dialogue, interactive and collaborative work, with somebody next to them, or a continent away. Distances are no longer an impediment. Is our personal creativity and effort as educators our sword against the killing of creativity?

Technofanatism…..!

2009-03-18T23:30:00.002-05:00

I’ve declared myself as a technology fan. I use many tools of current technology every single day, at work (twitter, yammer, blogger, wikispaces, skype, Notebook for SMART Boards, etc.), and despite the fact that I spend hours in front of the computer, I would have never thought to integrate technology in such a physical way, yes physical, like really!!

However you can’t help what people can do. regardless of practicality, inserting a USB 2 Gb fingertip is something that deserves a comment. How far are we going to get?

There is a computer programmer from Finland that lost part of one of his fingers, and replaced the tip with a USB flash memory. You can visit his blog at this link.

That is shocking, at least, practical maybe, but couldn’t he get a larger capacity? I mean, come on…..2 Gb? They sell 8 and 16 Gb devices for less than a friday night dinner price.

Anyway, I know it has practically nothing to do but I read a story a few weeks ago about a frenchman who discovered in his 40s that the size of his brain was significantly smaller than any other human being, living an average and quiet life.

Extremes are not good, I guess my mother was right when she used to tell me that. Judge for yourself.

Lifting a ban on progress

2009-03-09T21:12:00.002-05:00

About 8 years ago I moved to the US to work on science-related fields. It came as a very cold shower to hear the president Bush announce the world that the US government was cutting federal funding to Embryonic Stem Cell Research, and would only award funding for the atrins already obtained. time proved that those strains didn't produce major scientific breakthroughs.
It is well known that the US is no longer the major contributor of scientific breakthroughs in the world. That has several causes and implications, decreased number of undergraduate and graduate scientific research projects, ultra expensive college and university tuition costs, etc.
It is in Europe and Asia, where science has been bubbling for the last decade. Well, not all has been true, as is the case of some asian scientists reporting false information, but apart from that, research in stem cells has been in a better position in those latitudes.
Banning Stem Cell research funding was a religious-motivated decision, and let's not summon up all the backwards effects that the church has had over science and knowledge in human history.
It is not the dangers of the evil characters investigating and designing negative effects over stem cell research or any other scientific endeavor, it is the great advancement in knowledge and understanding in life and its origins that should prompt us to promote investigation in science.
Any activity has goods and bads, and banning an activity because it mat have negative effects, may have banned thousands of current and legal activities in our daily lives.
Stem cell research is not the panacea, but it's a great way to determine what we can get from the understanding of timing and programming.
I salute President Obama's decision on lifting the ban, as a citizen of the world and as a biologist.

Can child diabetes be prevented with a vaccine?

2009-03-07T18:59:00.002-05:00

A few weeks ago a friend of mine came from Monterrey, Mexico. We were having dinner with him and other friends from university. We're all biologists graduated from the same class. We were talking about many things in general, and one of them mentioned the fact that obesity could be caused by a virus. As interesting as it sounded, it didn't seem plausible to the rest of us.

It actually became a good reason to mock his comment, due to the overweight that many of us on that table carry. Although obesity has not been proved to be directly related to a viral infection, I just found out a report that indicates that a virus may trigger child diabetes.

Diabetes type 2, no longer referred to as late-onset diabetes because the onset age has been reduced from 40s to the teen years or less, is a serious public health concern in many countries arounf the world, especially in the 1st world countries, where that is becoming as common as a common cold.

Diabetes type 1, insulin-dependent, or juvenile insulin is also quite common around the world. And it is said that three-quarters of diabetes' cases are type 2.

But, what does this have to do with a virus, which is not alive or dead, however is a pre-life complex form of macromolecules perfectly structured and organized?

Well, it appears that enteroviruses have been found in 60% of pancreatic samples from type 1-diabetes patients and 40% of type 2-diabetes. This article was published in March, in the Diabetologia journal.

This is a great story to tell my students when teaching them about the way science funstions, and how sicientists' work is validated, cross-referenced, proved right or wrong, somtimes without any direct connection.

it appears that enteroviruses affects both types of diabetic patients intervening in immune reactions causing the disfunctionality of the insulin-producing machinery in the beta-cells of pancreas.

Another separate report in Science magazine mentions mutations in a gene that reduces the risk of diabetes, it just so happens that the gene is involved in the immune reaction to enteroviruses.

As in many cases of the intricate nature of our human physiology, no single-reason, single-effect is the cause of a major disease or condition. Multifactorial pathologies are immensely common.

The good news is that it could be possible to prepare an inactive form of the enteroviruses (one they're identified) and use it in a vaccination campaign to reduce the incidence of diabetes cases.

For more information, visit this link.

Happy Birthday Mr. Darwin!!!

2009-02-21T01:06:00.002-05:00

On february 12th, 1809 Charles Darwin was born, and so was Abraham Lincoln, the former in Shrewsbury-England, ans the latter in Spring Farm, Ketucky-USA. They both had significant work and imprtance in World History in the case of Darwin; and US History in the case of Lincoln.
But let's focus on Darwin. I was fascinated by his theory when I started reading about it, and even though many scientists have tried to prove him right or wrong, it is undeniable that his theory clarified the way we approached to changes of living organisms. This comment is like a double-edge sword because Charles Darwin's ideas have been criticized and disputed since the publication of The Origin of Species, his masterpiece. And even though it is the book that marked his evolutionary theory, he only mentions the term Evolution only once in his book.
Many have psychiologically analyzed Charles Darwin's ideas, work and life in general. Most of his work was a direct and indirect influence of his grandfather Erasmus Darwin, nothing less than one of the leading minds in the 19th century England.
Darwinists and NeoDarwinists, such as Richard Dawkins (The Selfish Gene) and Stephen Jay Gould (Ontogeny and Phylogeny) have had a hard work critizicing but maintaining Charles Darwin's ideas fresh, current and far from any expiration date.
I recommend to see the series of Darwin's life as part of an english production.. There are also a good number of video lectures by Standford University. Check them out.
Of course, speaking of evolution and Darwin I just cannot let pass the new concept in evolution mentioned by Juan Enriquez in his 2009 TED lecture, the Homo Evolutis. this is a very current, dynamic and entertaining presentation of today's crisis reality, robotics, scientific advances and evolution.

Such a Degenerate!!!

2009-02-08T12:45:00.005-05:00

Don't worry, I'm not going to talk about the 90,000 sex offenders kicked out of MySpace. I'm actually going to mention something that puzzled me when I was in my undergrad years. The Degenerated Genetic Code.
Our genetic code, or set of instructions coded in the DNA, is what alllows each cell in our body to synthesize proteins. Proteins are molecules of life formed by a chain of aminoacids that acquire a specific shape and function by folding its components into intricate 3d structures.
DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid) is composed of nucleotides, or genetic "letters": A (Adenine), T(Thymine), C(Cytosine), G(Guanine). Three of these letters together form a codon (triplet), or "genetic word". The meaning of each of those words is an aminoacid. When a long string of "genetic words" are read, a long chain of aminoacids is produced. This is done making a usable copy of DNA, called RNA (Ribonucleic Acid), a template made from DNA that can be read and then destroyed. The differences between DNA and RNA are: DNA is a double chain molecule, whereas RNA is a single chain molecule. DNA contains the nucleotides: A, T, C, G. in RNA, the nucleotides are: A, C, G and U (Uracil). Uracil replaces T in RNA.
It was well known that the positioning of each genetic letter (A, T, C, G) in the triplet or codon, would determine a different type of aminoacid. However, it had been found that when the first two letter positions remained constant, and only the third letter was changed, it could be observed that the aminoacid produced was the same. This is called Degenration of the Genetic Code.
However when the first or second letters were replaced or changed, a different aminoacid was produced, and the resulting protein usually was defective, or misfolded, useless for its original purpose in any case.
This is something like genetic synonimity, if the term can hold the analogy. Because more than one triplet could "mean" or produce the same aminoacid.
I just came across a report from the American Journal of Human Genetics that takes this degeneration to a research study that found that 1 in 200 genes can be superfluous or dispensable.
Here is the link to the article, take a look at it.

Class Management - January 29th, 2009

2009-01-29T08:08:00.000-05:00

Most people think that the teaching profession is not as honorable as it is. It is a very common thought that long vacation periods during the summer were an attractive portion of the profession. However, vacation periods for teachers are usually less than regular professionals in other areas. Teachers don't stay still during the time off, because they keep finding resources, new tools, best and more suitable lesson plans, etc.
In a world were globalization is our daily bread we can only think of the teaching profession as one of the more demanding of all. Because the available amount information is immense, and is growing exponentially. Those who choose to continue teaching the same contents from the previous year without any updates, will fall into the less visited or solicited teachers.
Kids demand a lot of attention, patience and respect. Most of what they are not willing to reciprocate until further their adulthood.
The following video is about class management and was produced in 1947, amazing.

And in this more "current" video made by students and teacher, you can see that the approach is significantly different from that used 60 years before.

How should we conduct our classes? Is there one masterplan? Can we simply extrapolate techniques to handle classroom behavior? The answer is simply NO!!!

Even though there are general guidelines and classroom behaviors that are universal, it is the student population what makes a customized adjustment necessary in order to succeed as a teacher and as a learner. Moreover, student population must be seriously polled to learn about the cultural differences and the nationalities from our students. I learned about CUltural Competency when I was trained to be a Medical Interpreter. And at this point in time, I think every profession should have a mandatory Cultural Competency course to be able to notiuce that different cultures have specific and vital differences within their own cultures.
It is very important to consider the mother language of most of the majority of the student population, but also consider that minority mother languages. this is important at the time of reviewing difficult concepts in subjects such as Science, History and Geography, as well as others. Private Bilingual Schools are a great example of that. But more important, is the public schools in certain countries such as: Canada, USA and England, where immigration is a serious issue to consider in public education.

For now, I must read a lot about teaching in bilingual environments, and I have to read that in more than one language as well.

I finish this post with a question: Should teachers in the future be proactive, facilitators, multiculturally-competent bilingual professionals?

Missing them.....

2008-12-23T18:26:00.000-05:00

It sounds ironic when you say that you miss work. Especially when you are a few days from your time off work, enjoying the holidays. However, as much as I want to rest and have fun with my family, can I stop working? Or, at least, can I stop searching for resources and new things to offer in and out of the classroom?
Yes! Vacations all summer, woohoo!!!........not really. I guess that's the fine print when you sign the professional contract to become an educator (working 8 hours at school and several more at home). I didn't leave for vacation time and I can't stop working about the curricular challenges for 2009. My country's academic year runs from march to december. So the holidays mark the end of the academic year too.
I tried to stay away from my tools of research: twitter, ning, monitter, etc. But, even though disconnected for a while, I know I can't get too far from from it. The rest of the world is learning and teaching at all times.
I use lots of videos in my classes, I found the next video from daibarnes at twitter. The US spends thousands of dollars per student every year, my country barely spends tens of dollars per student every year, and I think bioth have similar results in primary and secondary schools. This is no irony, it is a reality. Something that we have to face and that we must change.
The world says technology is the solution. I'm a huge fan of technology, I use it in all my classes, but I think technology alone is not the solution. We must not rely solely on that. The contribution that parents bring to students' performance when they get involved in their education is incomparable.
Get involved in your children's education and you'll see that education and many other areas of interest in their lives will improve.

Welcome Members of DIM-Barcelona, SPAIN

2008-12-16T16:34:00.000-05:00

Thanks to our visitors from DIM Barcelona-Spain, one of the greatest and most diverse cities in the world. Home to the best soccer team in the world, Barca FCB.....Can you tell I'm a big fan?
My blog is dedicated to the process of Learning anything interesting, with a tendency to explain and question things from the Science's and Technology's points of view, or at least I try to.
I hope you can enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.

Gracias a nuestros visitantes del DIM Barcelona-España, una de las más grandiosas y más diversas ciudades del mundo. Hogar del mejor equipo de fútbol del mundo, el Barca FCB.......¿Se nota que soy un gran fanático?
Mi blog está dedicado al proceso de Aprendizaje, con tendencia a explicar y cuestionar las cosas desde el punto de vista de la Ciencia y la Tecnología, o por lo menos eso intento.
Espero que disfruten leerlo tanto, como yo disfruto escribiéndolo.

Twisted Ankle - December 1st

2008-12-01T21:49:00.000-05:00

I twisted my ankle two days ago playing basketball at a school activity. I guess the intensity of the game and being out of shape caused that. Anyway, my case is very similar to many others suffering from overweight. Limb and hip injuries are very common in overweight people, because knees, feet and ankles have a limit to support the body's weight.
So, Ive spent the whole day working in the computer and producing a lot. Browsing the links that I receive daily stumbled upon this video, that even though is titled Ankle Injuries, has nothing to do do with the physical phenomenon, but a lot with patience and creativity. Take a look at it.

Fujiya & Miyagi- Ankle Injuries from Insound on Vimeo.

Widgets - December 1st

2008-12-01T16:39:00.000-05:00

I just found out this website called Sprout, it allows you to create your own widgets easily to promote things or to present information in an interactive way. I think it's a great way to make your web surfing more dynamic.

For those of you who have blogs and wikis, this list of places will also serve their purpose:

Lecturing - November 30th

2008-11-30T23:17:00.001-05:00

Last week I went to Rio de Janeiro to give two lectures about Wikis and its uses in Primary and Secondary Education. I went to share my experience during this year. Until february this year, I had never worked in blogs, wikis or anything beyond MSN Messenger and basic internet search engines.

But it took only a few weeks of basic training, institutional support and self-learning to become the ICT Coordinator at my school.

Going to Rio helped me realize that even though I have the possibility to communicate with anybody in the world in real-time through Plurk, Twitter, or receive the information in a matter of minutes after it was published in any part of the world through bloglines; not everybody does it.

Part because their technological immersion is still in the rise, or because the need to do it has not reached them yet. It reached me quickly, and even though I will never stop learning I feel happy to be part of the educational technology world team, because the distances in a global community are reduces with one or two clicks.

Reading and Writing in the 21st Century

2008-11-30T15:46:00.001-05:00

Learning to read and write are two of the most fundamental skills in humans. That's basically what differentiates us from the other superior animals. Although if you listen to many people talking or reading, it seems as if they didn't alphabetize at all.
Those two basic skills have been suffering changes in response to the changing technology in today's world.

The internet meant a whole new way of communication with people as general public, consumers, students and laymen. Advertising campaigns had to be modified to fit the format of small space and quick seconds-long ads from any brand or product in order to be published and targeted to specific audiences.

As any emerging technology, the internet had a great impact in children, teenagers and young adults. It is not a surprise that advertising in the internet was not different from the tv major campaigns. Even though it was an uncertain year or in the nineties when the internet got popular, it has consiolidated as a completely new way of doing business and shopping. It's not necessary to be hooked up to QVC or any other shopping channel, you could access to any brand with a website at anytime, from any part of the world.

And then came the Web 2.0, a brand new way to generate information. Anybody can contribute and/or publish anything, from family events to professional education. These technologies also require a new set of skills and styles of presentation of information. Because we read and write in different ways nowadays. It is actually not bad to write a lot through a computer, because you have the capabilities of instantaneous editing and improvement, instead of drawing scratches over paper, and pretend to move words with arrows from one position to another. The cherry on top is the fact that we pollute less and we help saving our planet.

And these days you can also read with your ears, yes. Thanks to audiobooks and podcasting, you can take lots of information in a simple mp3 player anywhere with you. So, everytime you're riding a bus, train or airplane, don't waste your time, learn something new by e-writing and e-reading (via audio or visual publications).

eWaste - November 12th

2008-11-12T02:13:00.000-05:00

As much as technology help us progressing: Those of us who have access to: tv, cable, wireless phones, mobile phones, and computers are avid users of technology.
But, where do we dump our technology trash or waste. At the current rate, the life span of a mobile phone is between 6 and 12 months, a computer's 12 to 18 months, and so on, just to name a few of the most popular ones.
Unfortunately eWaste is discarded in dumping places in countries such as China, and many poor countries located in latinamerica, to mention some.

Let's watch this video and think twice before we want to change our mobile phone just because the new "in" model comes out.

Watch CBS Videos Online

The Future - November 2nd

2008-11-02T16:38:00.000-05:00

I stumbled upon this conference about the future of media. Even though it's a long video, it is certainloy interesting to hear Gerd Leonhard, a known futurist, talking about Web 2.0 as our current future..... or present?

Table got SMARTer - October 29th

2008-10-29T18:15:00.000-05:00

I'm a big fan of using technology and web 2.0 resources in the classroom. The tool that allows me to do that in an interactive way is the Interactive White Board, or IWB. Since I started using it early this year, I embraced the countless resources it comes with, but best of all, it's the canvas I use to paint my classes with my originality and self-expression to present Science concepts and ideas.
Even though the goods of the IWB, one of the little flaws was the fact that only one user could interact with the board at the same time. However, it appears that it is not a problem anymore. Last thursday, Octobder 23rd Smart Tech (the manufacturer of the brand I use) released to the media the new version of the Smart family, The Smart Table. Customized for the little ones, primary students, those that get more enthusiastic when using it, the Smart Table allows several kids to touch the board at the same time, with a whole new set of ready-made activities and fully customizable. I'm certainly eager to try it, and I'm sure that all my students feel the same way too.

ICT in St. George's College - October 29th

2008-10-29T12:41:00.000-05:00

This is the presentation and video used to inform the PTA from St. George's College about our Technological Innovation Project. Please review and make your comments.

Blogging at 95 - October 24th

2008-10-24T00:09:00.000-05:00

I love blogging, because it is a great way to express, to learn and also to teach. But nothing is more impressive that appreciating when a person who is supposedly "outdated" in terms of technology embraces it and gets the best out of her to communicate it to the world. Amelia is a 95 year old lady from La Coruña, Spain who received a blog as her 95th present from her grandson.
Happy Birthday Amelia!
Keep blogging so we can learn from your enthusiasm and energy.

Wiki, Week, and Weak - October 15th

2008-10-15T18:00:00.000-05:00

"Men are from Mars and Women are from venus" or so said John Gray when published his book in 1992. Cliché phrases are everywhere in our daily lives. I actually found a website that helps you find clichés. Technology doesn't escape from clichés. Female presence in the ICt area is not as high as the male one, yet. I think that proportion will reverse soon. My experience with Wikis is reduced to a few jonths only. I work producing weekly edits in my class wikis, even though I was as weak as any IT ignorant until I discovered the benefit of being "connected". you're in the loop as long as you participate in the world. The World Wide Web has opened new possibilities in the communication area. I read dozens of updates in my twitter network. I follow a lot of people in the same area. I benefit from them. I use all that expertise as an empowerment. ICT empowers my mind, it challenges my perception of things and keeps me very busy, that's for sure.

It helps me discover that there is a whole world of possibilities on a nanosecond base, and if you are out of the loop you'll be delayed in your professional development. Will that be my weakness if I stop checking information on a weekend? I saw a great video the other day, shifthappens, check it out. Information generated daily is doubling on astronomical figures and in shorter time than just a few decades before. I'll try to keep up-to-date!

Elections - October 13th

2008-10-14T09:02:00.000-05:00

Even though this blog is not a political one, or it doesn't intend to be by any means. I have to recognize that elections have a special attraction, many times disappointing but mostly challenging, who will be the winner? What is that nation choosing for its future?
Sometimes little decisions can have a tremendous consequence, good or bad. Can you imagine how deciding the election of a new president might alter the course of a country over time?
We face that every time we, as adults, vote for a new president. I have to admit that choosing a new president for my country has been plagued with irregularities and/or decisions not in favor of one but against the other, at least in Peru for the last 20 years.
Just a few weeks ago we've been witnesses of the collapse of a big part of the financial system, and even though we dare to say that our world is too big, the financial tsunami has reached each and every continent, and those who were not properly protected economically, are suffering the consequences, starting in the very own capitalism epicenter, the United States of America.
So, I found a web 2.0 application, a timeline, to follow the US elections, soon to happen.
Therefore, if you're a little but interested, check out this timeline and decide which side you're on.

Dinobirds - September 29th

2008-09-29T20:54:00.001-05:00

Ever since I remember, I knew dinosaurs were extinct. The discussion was how they disappeared not if. And even though there is no final word about it, the consensus is that dinosaurs suffered from a series of dramatic changes in the climates supporting their voracious appetites and necessities.

However, evolution is hard to predict. So a hypothesis started ringing the bells of science and modern scientists claimed since the 19th century that birds were the living descendants of dinosaurs, and ever since the discussion has been in place, supported mostly by the discovery of fossils such as the Archaeopteryx, strongly linking dinosaurs and birds.

Besides, it doesn't take much comparing an ostrich with the image of a velociraptor, they are about the same size, strong legs for running, long neck and elongated snout, etc, etc. Of course, that is out of my imagination, but it's not difficult to see the resemblance, moreover when we talk about certain key bones being conserved in both animals.

Anyway, PLoS just published a study done in a Aerosteon riocoloradensis, a dinosaur that lived 85 million years ago in Argentina and that possessed a bird-like respiratory system. A very interesting report that tells us about the "invention" in nature of a structure later exploited by a different species. Related or not? Probably, until we have a certain anser these reports bring us something good to read.

Etiquetas de Technorati: dinosaur,bird,evolution,bone,nature,science

Green thoughts, or so i thought - September 27th

2008-09-27T21:19:00.000-05:00

I remember reading about serious green movements in the early 90's when I was coming out of my teenage years. It sounded as the right thing to do, but how much have we done ever since? Buty "we" I mean us, society, you, me and everybody else. Governments sign agreements, treaties, one less respected than others. As with any other world topic, it is subjected to politics but, in this case, mainly to economics. Yes because it is the money the ruler of any movement right or wrong trying to save our planet.

Our society and even the industry predicates the good manners to conserve our planet. Be sure that I started being very concerned when news kept coming about global warming, ice caps melting, icebergs breaking down, hurricanes increasing frequency and intensity, El Niño visiting us more often, etc.

All of this made me think, how are my two children going to live in this world. When they turn 25, the world's population will be around 9 billion people, and I'm sure the oil will still be driving the economy, but it will have a very strong competitor, water.

Yes, water shortage is a reality. and not a projection. Not in vane "Thirst" was the winner of the SlideShare annual contest, because it is something we are living, not something we're hypothesizing.

THIRST

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: design crisis)

Hear me on this...or you won't later - September 27th

2008-09-27T21:01:00.000-05:00

I'm a great fan of technology and the products derived from it. It amazes me that we are able to handle information (audio, video, documents, etc) in the way we do nowadays, whatever the information is we can carry it, send it, remix it, upload it, download it or anything that a computer allows us to do.
But as any other human activity, if we don't control its use responsibly, we can lose important things such as your ability to hear.
NIHL (Noise Induced Hearing Loss) is a condition that is on the rise because most earphone users are not paying attention to the big picture, keep it low.
The use, or abuse, of loud sounds directed to your ear canal will have a damaging effect if you don't control its use.
I recommend you to follow simple guidelines published in this document from the Minnesota Department of Health.
And please, don't let this message fall in deaf ears!

Daring Education - September 21st

2008-09-21T14:35:00.000-05:00

Every single time I open my bloglines account, or visit my favorite sites from my delicious account, I get constant reminders that information and communication technology (ICT) is the current technology. it's difficult to adapt to changes, but that's what human beings excel at, no wonder we have advanced more in the last 200 years than in the previous 18 centuries. Before people use to create friends communities by postal mail, waiting for replies every month. Nowadays your replies can take a minute or two, literally. Communication has experienced a revolutionary growth speed. Videoconferencing by Skype, or other tools such as Ekko, help you realize that the world isn't that big, and that we are closer to each other than we suspect.
Denying that ICT is a major tool to spread the knowledge is like going back to light up cities with candles and oil torches. Could we make it to our final destination? Sure, at some point. Is taking too long being necessarily conservative? No, it is just denying a reality.
Try it. Give your students the power to speak, podcast, webcast, reply 24/7.
Check out the following video, a daring video with a reality that is closer to you than you realize. If not, ask your son or daughter how many people can they meet through the WWW.

TecnoEducación - Septiembre 20

2008-09-20T11:11:00.000-05:00

El nivel de exigencia que se vive hoy en día en la educación va cada vez más en aumento. Pero no me refiero a la exigencia hacia los alumnos por hacer tareas y estudiar, más bien es la exigencia de los alumnos sobre el sistema de educación y la metodología educativa lo que cambia, evoluciona y demanda una renovación constante acorde con las nuevas tendencias mundiales.Hasta hace no muchos años se pensaba que al Perú las cosas tardarían varios años en llegar, más aún cuando se trataba de tecnología. Sin embargo, el mundo de hoy es un mundo que se puede recorrer en segundos a través de tours virtuales con Google Earth, Educación en Europa, Mitos Mundiales, etc.
Uno de los ámbitos en donde el uso de la tecnología viene siendo utilizada con gran amplitud es la Educación. Veamos una pequeña prueba de ellos en el siguiente video:

Nuestro Colegio está seriamente comprometido con liderar el uso de las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación. La implementación de las nuevas tecnologías: Podcast, Webcast, Moodle, y las innumerables herramientas Web 2.0 vienen siendo parte de una gran capacitación a nivel de docentes, para poder utilizarlas de forma directa en las aulas. Nuestros docentes se encuentran en una constante capacitación y entrenamiento en estas herramientas.
La información está esperando para que cualquiera la encuentre, analice y modifique. Nosotros, los docentes, somos los encargados de señalar el camino de forma interactiva y dinámica.

ICT in Education - August 27th, 2008

2008-08-27T21:18:00.001-05:00

I've mentioned before that the education is constantly evolving, but for the last few years the incorporation of the Information and Communication Technologies, or ICTs is an unstoppable tendency. Our school is constantly working trying to implement the use of technology as a complementary tool within the teaching methodology. The use of the Web 2.0 tools is becoming a must in our classes. And for those of us who appreciate the use of technology instead of banning it within the classrooom is always useful to find and implement the direct use and impact of these tools in our lessons preparation.

Today's teacher is constantly looking for new and innovative ways to present information in a way that the primary beneficiary has to be the student. Nowadays the information is not reserved, on the contrary it is available for anybody, at any time and from anywehere.

Tools are always useful, that's why I share this nice presentation found recently in the web giving us a great deal of websites and tools.

101 Free Learning Tools

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: teaching thinking)

Learning for the future, or the present? - August 2nd

2008-08-02T13:43:00.001-05:00

The methodologies in Education have been changing along time. Lecture-based, skills-based, curriculum-based, etc.

It appears that new times bring new methodologies, or tendencies. Nowadays though, the tendency tends to be a giant snow ball coming to us. So we can choose to ride with it or we surrender to it, regardless if we are students, parents or teachers.

The change to a more technological working position brings some resistance, usually. but that resistance is evaporated once the virtues of the "new" technology are discovered and incorporated into the personal way of working.

Our current technology, demands that as teachers we should be at the forefront of guidance. yes, only guidance. Our capabilities will soon be surpassed by the most skillful and/or dedicated savvy students.

So we better go with the roll and guide the tour of teaching through technology or we will be considered eternal students of something that we reject, technology.

I found a great video that shows in a very simple but clear way what students want, think, and need. Check ot out.

Videos as a powerful educational tool - July 30th

2008-07-30T11:38:00.000-05:00

Videos have been in our lives for a few decades already. But it wasn't until the explosion of electronics and the low pricing of video cameras that the regular citizen was able to really grab this technology. Even better, the internet has offered a global distribution platform without limits, literally. Anyone that has access to the internet is able to search, upload, or download videos 24/7/365. But that's not all, videos are a powerful tool in the classroom too. My Science classes would be empty without videos. My video search is a constant in my weekly duties. I'm sure my students appreciate videos too, although sometimes they don't show it. You know, things are never cool enough for them. I was born with cable tv and computers in my adolescent years, they were born with broadband connection, Youtube and web 2.0.

The following video is the presentation that Professor Michael Wesch recently did at the US Library of Congress. An interesting compilation and testimony about the use of videos and its transcendence in our daily life. Enjoy!

iKids - July 26th, 2008

2008-07-26T14:53:00.000-05:00

As a teacher, have you ever asked your students how they want to be taught? i certainly have not in the purest sense. Even though i try to mold a little bit my class to what the kids like by using interactive resources, it is difficult to hear from the student that they have no interest in this or that. I just read a publication from the magazine Edutopia, where an article opens eyes and ideas. It was interesting to be reprimanded that the schools and teachers don't investigate what their students want, as it says there: "Unlike in the corporate world, where businesses spend tens of millions researching what their consumers really want, when it comes to how we structure and organize our kids' education, we generally don't make the slightest attempt to listen to, or even care, what students think about how they are taught." Tough punch.

My best approach has been to offer them options and exercising democracy and having them vote for the options that sometimes they come up with.

Should we bring our articulate students to our board meetings to share their ideas and perceptions of their own education?

Animal Power to reduce GHG - July 26th, 2008

2008-07-26T12:46:00.000-05:00

Greenhouse gases (GHG) are causing our planet to warm to temperatures that are melting the icebergs at damaging rates already. Reducing car emissions, lowering the burning of fossil fuels, and searching for alternative sources of energy are the current trends in government actions around the world. Capturing the CO2 underwater is also an option that has been explored for some years already, but that is part of the plant kingdom function, as long as we take care of that kingdom we'll be securing our future too. Unfortunately there many fronts to work on, lots of people to educate and a tons of work to be done. Some is done, but it appears that is not enough.

For those of us who love to eat meat, there will be a better way to contribute to the environment. Converting livestock manure into biogas is something that isproved to be benefitial in many ways. Leaving manure to biodegrade takes time and contaminates a lot.

Did you know that the gases emitted by decomposing manure, methane and nitrous oxide warm up our atmosphere 21 and 320 times more than carbon dioxide. Yes, astounding right?

A group of researches have published a study in the Environmental Research Letters confirming that working on manure to obtain energy and decreasing the detrimental effect of warming our atmosphere is feasible and convenient.

Considering that most nations have a large consumption of livestock products this is a great initiative.

Bat the fat! - July 25th, 2008

2008-07-25T23:03:00.000-05:00

Trans fat is a type of modified fat, vegetable oil (liquid) is transformed into solid fat. But, why is it done? Simply because it has neutral flavor, it's good for frying and makes foods last longer, as it is mentioned by the BBC news update. This update tells us that California is the first US state to ban trans fat in their foods, following previous initiatives from some cities like New York and Philadelphia.

Trans fats are linked to increasing levels of the LDL or bad cholesterol, the type of cholesterol that makes our cell membranes less fluid, and our arteries harder than necessary, finally connected with heart conditions, of course that happens after years of daily trans fat consumption.

Cis fat in turn, is a good type of fat, because it is what our cells regularly use. And as polyunsaturated fats, they are considered heart-friendly.

So the California initiative is a very good one, shame it will be fully implemented starting January 1, 2010 and not before.

Spinal Cord Injuries - July 23rd, 2008

2008-07-23T16:23:00.001-05:00

I just read about some exciting news. Investigation has been conducted on spinal cord injuries and found that stem cells within the spinal cord could help injured patients if they are properly stimulated to cause less scarring and more and more healing cells.

We hear about stem cells practically on a daily basis, something hard to believe considering that it still raises so many so-called ethical issues.

Regardless of politics or ethics, stem cells will probably the weapon against major diseases that are killing millions around the world nowadays.

We only need to remember that stem cells aren't only obtained from frozen embryos from fertility clinics, they can also be obtained by more mature cells in the body.

You can obtain the open access report by visiting the PLoS Biology website.

Fertility - July 7th, 2008

2008-07-07T11:23:00.000-05:00

Fertility has been an issue since the beginning of human societies. According to its definiton, it is the capacity to conceive and generate offspring. In many ways, fertility is one of nature's selective methods to allow only the fittest to continue the life journey along time.

Plants have great resources for reproduction: wind, water, animal-assistance, etc. Some animals also use some of those resources. However, the more complex the animal, the more complex the reproductive method, and the least successful. Sexual reproduction in complex animals such as humans has been a major advance, but also a major restriction. Why? Humans as animals, cannot survive purely by themselves until late infancy. Which means that humans need a lot of support, energy and guidance. And who is going to provide that but the mother.

Humans need extra energy and time, because they need to mature a series of complex structures (organs and systems) that will help accomplish life's exigencies.

Most of these requirements are guided toward the maturation of the nervous system, mainly the growth of the brain and its annex structures. That is human's trade off. It has been a sacrifice to invest in a longer period of gestation and rearing to obtain a highly-complex, multi-tasking animal capable of interacting with its envioronment not only sensorially but also at a very important level, socioculturally.

So fertility problems, or difficulties to conceive or produce an offspring is just another way nature has used to select us as living things.

But as any other problem, we gçfound a way around to solve it. Infertility treatments started decades ago with trial and error as the main technique, and it wasn't until the late 60's that artificial insemination really started working. And only in 1978, Louise Joy Browne, the first baby conceived by InVitro Fertilization was born in England after Robert Edwards, PhD and Patrick Steptoe, MD performed hundreds of experimental procedures trying to overcome the blocking of fallopian tubes. Decades have past since that first success, and many other procedures have been implemented in the fertility lab, such as: GIFT and ZIFT, SUZI, ICSI, Oocyte maturation, sperm-retrieval procedures and lately, PGD, and lately IMSI.

The question here is, what is the limit? I just read a news report that indicates that a 70 year old woman has delivered twins. Even though I support the assisted reproductive techniques, I think it must be limited to people under a certain range of age. Because, as a father, I can testify that raising kids takes a lot of physical and mental effort, but overall the main ingredient nowadays, is to be able to give them our TIME.

Prions - June 25th, 2008

2008-06-24T23:59:00.000-05:00

It was during my undergraduate years that I started appreciating the trascendence of the work as a scientist. Dr. Stanley Prusiner was not taken seriously initially when he announced the existence of a nonliving transforming agent to the scientific community around the mid 80s.

Prions are chaperone proteins, polypeptides in charge of the folding of other proteins. When a cell contains the infective form, the consequences can be counted by the millions, of cows and dollars. But as humans, we are not exempt of the risks. We can contract a type of prion disease called CJD or Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, where the brain becomes something like a sponge, literally.

A new report has come out informing that prions are a very strong form af aberrant proteins, describing the work of Wisconsin scientists reporting the persistence of prions in wastewater 20 days after the water passed through regular sewage treatment.

This report is available as open-access in this link.

World Wide Web 2.0 - June 24th, 2008

2008-06-24T21:08:00.000-05:00

There has been an explosion followed by a snowball coming to us at all times, it is called flow of information. The resources derived from and to handle all sorts of information generated from the ever-expanding knowledge, but most of all by the practically unlimited availability of it, is astounding. Proof of that is the exponential amount of blogs and wikis that have been in the last few years. This is certainly a new generation of interaction between user, interface and the powerful feedback.

There are several websites that promote the use of the new types of tools available: cool, fresh, dynamic and friendly web 2.0 tools. Pages such as Go2Web2.0, and Mosaic are good examples of that.

the best of all is that a new way to interact and present information is available in Education. Generating contents with new approaches, visions and levelsof interactivity. Let's celebrate the web 2.0 and the possibilities it brings us for our social, academic, business and personal life.

Educating with Skills - June 24th, 2008

2008-06-24T09:53:00.001-05:00

My school is very interested in students learning skills through the Inquiry-based Learning, an investigative method that allows students to search, review, filter and integrate information in order to answer to open-ended questions.

This is a great approach for kids to develop the skills that remain dormant for many years, in some cases. And that would make student's life much easier in higher education instances.

Learning that you have skills is probably the greatest part of all, because it is a discovery in any student's mind and body capability to solve problems, or difficult situations. Does it sound like real lfe? Yes it does. Those skills are so important that will be required for the rest of your life. Might as well start learning them now as a kid than later when the pressure and promptness to succeed make it much more difficult.

This learning approach has been around for some time with other similar names, PYP for example. I was lucky to be part of a training given by Lesley & Kenneth Snowball, founders and strong promoters of this learning approach around the world.

Integrating the inquiry-based learning with the Bloom's taxonomy, and the strong theoretical contents of today's education, is the goal to prepare a student to solve a problem in Peru, USa or China, because the skills will be there to assist in the journey of life and its academic problems.

Quality in Education - June 16th, 2008

2008-06-16T23:03:00.000-05:00

Education is a very clear concept, obtaining knowledge and experiences to enlighten one's background. The education has been around us for thousands of years, in one way or another.
Education, as well as any other part of the human expression, has suffered "revolutions" along time.
It wasn't until a few decades ago that the use of a green board with dusty chalks (white at the beginning, coloured later) was the gold standard. Time after, year after year, the evolution of technology and the implementation of it around the sociocultural environment has marked distinct changes in education.
State-sponsored education, still very popular in many countries around the world, is no longer the prime source of knowledge production. Private institutions, with a significant presence in forming renowned scientists and thinkers are probably the leading machinery of knowledge production nowadays.
However, Education has entered into a new era. Knowledge is no longer reserved for the elite families or people with lots of financial resources. Money is not the primary obstacle for a person to be educated. Willingness and progress desire is the main ingredient, but technology and its open and immensely vast of available resources, not only of educational material but also in the current ways to creating, communicating, disseminating, and sharing information.
Perhaps the "obstacle" nowadays is to decide what to study, where to study and when. Age is not a problem, many universities in different countries have older adult programs.
It is the amount of information that is unstoppable what sets people in jeopardy if good education is not part of its resume.
Finally, developing countries like Peru are used to form and educate people with lots and lots of skills to compensate for the lack of resources (books, equipment, technology, etc) that are perfect for facing the first world working markets as well as postgraduate studies.
Even though my country has been placed in one of the last positions in educational achievements of our region, there is a lot valuable people trying to revert this uncomfortable truth. Unfortunately, usually the ones in charge of taking the decisions are the first blockers of progress, here and anywhere.

Bionic Hand - June 10th, 2008

2008-06-10T23:12:00.000-05:00

On April 23rd I posted a picture and a brief comment about a bionic eye implants that was developed for blind people to recover, or obtain, detection of light and imagery.

Now a new report has come out about bionics, in this case it is a bionic hand that has won Britain most prestiged award in engineering, the Mac Robert Award.

This is an interesting device called the iLimb, it has the five fingers separately powered. This device came out for sale in July 2007 with a price of 10,000 pounds and has been used in mutilated soldiers and patients with no limbs. It's worth taking a look at this technology and the video that the BBC presented with the interview of one of the patients using the device.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7445543.stm

Immersed in Technology - June 6th, 2008

2008-06-06T12:28:00.000-05:00

It's been only 4 months since I came into this world, yes into the eLearning, Web 2.0, Teacher 2.0, world. It all came amazingly fast to me. I started working in St. George's College in february of this year, and from there on my appreciation on technological tools changed dramatically.
I didn't have a blog or a wiki before. Now I have 2 blogs and 2 wikis.
The Wikis I've prepared are mostly dedicated to class contents, dates, homeworks, assignments, deadlines, etc.
The blogs are focused into something fresh. Something you can read if you're interested in Science or any topic of significant cultural or academic impact.
My first Wiki is a dedicated, and very useful and powerful tool that allows me to extend the communication I have with my students, but also with their parents. That's one of the powerful parts. Although I have to recognize it was not easy to introduce students...and parents into this "new" technology. Even though Blogs and Wikis are not new, in computer time, they are still entering into the Educational world, faster and faster everyday.
The most difficult part was to let people open their eyes, including myself, to an endless list of possible resources, techniques, designs, and content that was usually reserved for elite populations.
that's the beauty of it, knowledge has entered into a real democracy, anyone with an internet connection has access to a limitless amount of information.
All you need to KNOW is that the resources are there for you to start using them and exploiting them, at home, at work and now, in classrooms.
Although it is extremely important that facing such an immense flow of information we must FILTER that information, because not everything will be useful for you at the same time.
My students from lower 5th grade up to middle 1st grade (5th to 7th grade) have learned in the past 3 months to deal with Interactive SMART Boards, Notebook presentations, Issuu displays, PDF documents, Flash Animations, Inserted Images and Videos, Blogs, Wikis, and Podcast.
Three months ago they were not used to this, nowadays they demand that from me. They request that I publish classes and information faster.
I don't know how this will keep changing and evolving, but one thing is certain, it is here we might as well use it or, our student will leave us behind sooner or later.

Teachers Teaching Teachers

2008-06-02T14:44:00.000-05:00

Teachers Teaching Teachers TTTThis past saturday, May 31st, the TTT event took place in Lima-Peru. In Peruano Britanico, the primary teachers, and in San Silvestre for Secondary Teachers, we all had a great experience to learn from peers.I was fortunate because I could present a lecture about "Demonstration of Wikis and Blogs and Internet Resources in the Science Claaroom". For those who couldn't assist to my lecture I publish it in the following link :

Corals - May 27th, 2008

2008-05-27T13:33:00.000-05:00

Are you aware of Corals?
They are easily confused with plants bytheir appearance, but these animals display a wide variety of beautiful colors and shapes, that magnify the appeal of seawater.
You can experience a little bit of that with this application from Mapwing.

Do you believe in Resurrection? - May 25th, 2008

2008-05-25T21:21:00.000-05:00

Until a few days ago, resurrection to me only brought memories from my childhood when learning about religious concepts, and more recently from blockbuster science fiction movies, like Jurassic Park. However, this week a report came out from real scientists announcing that they had been able to resurrect the function of a gene from an extinct animal's genome, the Tasmanian Tiger. Despite its name, this animal was a quiet hunter of a small size, that resembled a striped dog. Officially declared extinct in 1986, but its disappearance was a reality several years before that.

On May 21st, an article appeared in the journal PLoS One, a free-access journal, the report became available.

Take a look at the article, who knows maybe in a few years science fiction will become a reality.

Is there Life on Mars? - May 24th, 2008

2008-05-24T19:53:00.000-05:00

That is a question that has been in many of scientists for a very long time. Why is it important to know that there is water on Mars?

Mars is one of the few terrestrial planets in our Solar System, others are Venus and Mercury.
Mars has a thin atmosphere and surface features (peaks, valleys, deserts, and polar ice caps) that resemble those in our planet.
It is specifically to the Polar Ice Caps where NASA has focused its attention. In August 2007, the Phoenix Mars Lander was launched with the purpose of digging the surface of the martian polar ice caps and find water and other molecules that could prove the existence of life in the red planet.
On Sunday, May 25th after 10 months, Phoenix will land (hopefully safe!) on the Martian Arctic. Follow this remarkable event through NASA's tv channel.

Universal Grammar - May 20th, 2008

2008-05-20T10:13:00.000-05:00

This is one of those theories that are truly universal. The ability for all human beings to acquire language whatever this is, has been one of the most solid scientific basics in Neuroscience for the last decades. This was proposed by a brilliant scientist, Mr. Noam Chomsky. Here we can see one of his last interviews.

Internet and Education - May 18th, 2008

2008-05-18T09:04:00.000-05:00

Are you familiar with the Internet? That sounds like a rhetorical question nowadays. Regardless of their age, children are becoming more and more familiar with the use of computers in the world wide web. The level of interaction and the amount of current information is practically unlimited.
We have to be careful though to control that the reight information is delivered to the right person, at all times.
But the internet doesn´t only "help" you finish yoiur homework providing the information and or pictures for your assignment. There is an in creasing tendency to do classes online. E-learning, 0nline classes or webeducation are a few of terms used to indicate that your classes are carried out online. Why not? It is cheap, reliable, affordable and interesting. The graphic and audiovisual interface helps capturing the attention of students.
Take a look at this article that indicates that in a few years, up to 50% of classes will be online.
Report: Half of High School Classes Could Be Online by 2019

Charles Darwin - Natural Selection - May 14th, 2008

2008-05-14T20:38:00.001-05:00

HMS Beagle, Galapagos Islands, Finches, Tortoises, Natural Selection and the Origin of Species are all words that we immediately recognize as part of Charles Darwin's life. But we think of him and his theory of evolution, we mainly think of it in animal terms. But surprisingly, Charles Darwin was highly trained in the area of botany.
Let´s hear this podcast from Scientific Talk from Scientific American to know a little bit more about Darwin's garden affinities. You should also take a look at the fine New York Botanical Garden exhibit.

Evolution Enclaves: Darwin the Botanist and Origins of Life Research

News - Wednesday May 14th, 2008

2008-05-14T20:11:00.000-05:00

Bacteria killing

Misuse of antibiotics has well-known consequences, all resumed into one, antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria that are challenging the medical expertise of today's physicians when facing a patient with one of these strains.

Creating resistance is like going back to the 19th century from a medical point of view, because youa re at the microorganisms' disposal.

Pharmaceutical research to create new drugs and the clearance from clinical trials are not fast-enough to cope with the bacterial mutation capacity. Other alternatives are always an option, although scarcely found.

However as we will see in the next report the situation might change in our favor.

Self-Sterilizing Plastics Kill Drug-Resistant Bacteria

A biotech company is developing polymers and medicines that attack microorganisms.

Despite the proliferation of antibiotics and assorted antibacterial hand lotions and wipes, bacteria remain a moving target for hospitals and clinics seeking to protect their patients from infections. One approach gaining traction in the effort to banish bacteria is to mimic the way the human body attacks these microorganisms by punching holes in bacterial cell membranes and hobbling their ability to morph into antibiotic-resistant pathogens.

PolyMedix is, with the help of scientists at the University of Pennsylvania, developing drugs and polymers that behave much like the body's own defenses. Among those in the works: medications that can kill bacteria without the need to actually enter the cells themselves as well as new polymers that the company hopes will be used in paints, plastics and textiles to create self-sterilizing products and surfaces. The polymer is not a coating like silver, ammonium salts or phenols. "Our compounds become part of the surface," he says, and can kill bacteria in a matter of seconds. "If you make the antibiotic part of the material, the effect is long lasting."

Technology Use increases Social Skills in Students - May 5th, 2008

2008-05-05T23:51:00.000-05:00

Tech encourages students' social skills Studies illustrate how some classroom technology can lead to student collaboration

Well-integrated technology opens social networks for students and allows children to develop key social skills, according to two recent studies conducted by researchers at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Tutorials for Teachers - May 5th, 2008

2008-05-05T23:42:00.000-05:00

This information was obtained through one of my feeds from Bloglines. It's very interesting for those of us who use Microsoft Office intensively. Check it out!
These tutorials for Microsoft's Office 2007 are designed to help pre-service and in-service teachers learn the set of applications included in Microsoft Office 2007. Bernie also has sets of tutorials for Office 2000, Office XP, and Office 2003. The tutorials, with skill consolidation exercises, are designed to teach Word (including mail merge), Excel (including graphing and charting and Lookup Tables), Access (including searching, sorting, and reporting), and PowerPoint in the context of the K-12 classroom. They also include a lesson on the Office 2007 drawing and diagramming tools.
http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/columnists/poole/office_tutorials/

Blogging - May 5th, 2008

2008-05-05T23:34:00.000-05:00

Blogs, or Weblogs, are one of the fascinating tools of the Web 2.0 generation of tools from the Internet. These tools are totally interactive tools that allow layman people communicate, edit, and publish injformation of all types. Blogs are used for many purposes. this blog, for example, is the tool for science students and curious people to learn about current and interesting news about Science.
In San Jorge School we try to use blogs and other technology tools to reach out to students and parents so we can create a community of wisdom, shared from all points of view.
Here is a sample video about why blogging is beneficial:

SMART Board use in San Jorge School - May 1st, 2008

2008-05-01T08:45:00.000-05:00

San Jorge School ac quired 5 SMART Boards for this year. Our experience as teachers with that technolopgy has been certainly gratifying, despite the fact that we're just starting to know how to use it.

The use of its vurtues and flexibility in terms of using images, sounds, videos, flash animations, and all the resources that can be acquired from the company's website are so big that you need a lot of time to start learning and interacting with all these tools.

At San Jorge the use of the SMART Board is becoming more and more4 popular, either during regular classes or for lectures and speeches given by teachers.

There is no recommended age for this technology, anybody can use it, even the little ones from Nursery up to the older students in the Upper secondary level.

We are very enthusiastic that coupling this new technology with the use of the Wiki pages and Blogs will have a strong and promising future in the use of Innovative Technologies for the Education of students at San Jorge School.

This technology is everywhere as we will know after reading the following link:

The Whiteboard Revolution

Science News - April 26th

2008-04-26T15:41:00.000-05:00

Cereal Mothers: Babies' Sex Linked to Moms' Breakfast Calories
British researchers say a new study shows that would-be moms who skip breakfast are more likely to have girls than boys.

Want a son? Pack on the calories. Biologist Fiona Mathews of the University of Exeter in England and her colleagues surveyed 740 first-time mothers on their pre-pregnancy eating habits and found that 56 percent of those on high-calorie diets had sons, compared with 45 percent of those on leaner menus.But it wasn't only calories that contributed; specific foods also appear to play a role, say researchers. "Prior to pregnancy, breakfast cereal, but no other item, was strongly associated with infant sex," the researchers write in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. "Women producing male infants consumed more breakfast cereal than those with female infants."The reason is a mystery, but Mathews speculates that glucose may be key. This type of sugar, converted by the human body into energy, is a by-product of the breakdown of carbohydrates such as those in breakfast cereal. Women who do not eat breakfast tend to have low levels of glucose, and other studies have shown that glucose enhances the growth of male fetuses in vitro.

DoD establishes institute tasked with regrowing body parts

The Defense Department today launched a five-year, Army-led cooperative effort to leverage cutting-edge medical technology to develop new ways to assist servicemembers who’ve suffered severe, disfiguring wounds during their wartime service.

The newly established Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative Medicine, known by the acronym AFIRM, will serve as the military’s operational agency for the effort, Dr. S. Ward Casscells, the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, told reporters at a Pentagon news conference. A key component of the initiative is to harness stem cell research and technology in finding innovative ways to use a patient’s natural cellular structure to reconstruct new skin, muscles and tendons, and even ears, noses and fingers, Casscells said.

MIT researcher aims to understand language with Human Speechome Project

It's far from the first time a researcher has enlisted the help of his own family or kids, but MIT's Deb Roy's latest endeavor looks to be a bit more ambitious than most, as he's aiming to do nothing short of understand how children learn language. To do that, Roy and his wife installed 11 video cameras and 14 microphones throughout their house to record just about every moment of their son's first three years. That, obviously, also required a good deal of computing power, which came in the form of a temperature-controlled data-storage room consisting of five Apple Xserves and a 4.4TB Xserve RAID (you can guess why Apple's profiling 'em), along with an array of backup tape drives and robotic tape changes (and an amply supply of other Macs, of course). While the project is obviously still a work in progress, they have apparently already developed some new methods for audio and video pattern recognition, among other things, and it seems they'll have plenty of work to sift through for years to come, with the project expected to churn out some 1.4 petabytes of data by the end of year three.

Ancient Praying Mantis Found in Amber
Julian Ryall in Tokyofor National Geographic News
April 25, 2008
An 87-million-year-old praying mantis found encased in amber in Japan may be a "missing link" between mantises from the Cretaceous period and modern-day insects.
The fossil mantis measures 0.5 inch (1.4 centimeters) from its antennae to the tip of its abdomen.

Although the forelegs, head, and antennae appear to be well preserved, the wings and abdomen have been badly crushed.

Science News - April 24th, 2008

2008-04-24T09:52:00.000-05:00

Heart cells cultured in the lab
Scientists have moved a step closer to creating functioning heart tissue for transplants in the lab.
They have grown three types of human heart cells from cultures derived from embryonic stem cells. When a mix of the cells was transplanted into mice with simulated heart disease, the animals' heart function was significantly improved.
The study, by a team of Canadian, US and UK scientists, features in the journal Nature.
The researchers created the cells by supplying embryonic stem cell cultures with a cocktail of growth factors and other molecules involved in development.
By supplying the right growth factors at the right time, they encouraged the cells to grow into immature versions of three different types of cardiac cell.

Science News - April 23rd

2008-04-23T14:04:00.000-05:00

Bionic eye 'blindness cure hope'
The AMD disease leads to a progressive loss of sight
A 'bionic eye' may hold the key to returning sight to people left blind by a hereditary disease, experts believe.
A team at London's Moorfields Eye Hospital have carried out the treatment on the UK's first patients as part of a clinical study into the therapy.
The artificial eye, connected to a camera on a pair of glasses, has been developed by US firm Second Sight.
It said the technique may be able to restore a basic level of vision, but experts warned it was still early days.
The trial aims to help people who have been made blind through retinitis pigmentosa, a group of inherited eye diseases that affects the retina.

Science News - April 18th

2008-04-18T23:09:00.000-05:00

Vitamins 'may shorten your life'

Research has suggested certain vitamin supplements do not extend life and could even lead to a premature death.
A review of 67 studies found "no convincing evidence" that antioxidant supplements cut the risk of dying.
Scientists at Copenhagen University said vitamins A and E could interfere with the body's natural defences.
"Even more, beta-carotene, vitamin A, and vitamin E seem to increase mortality," according to the review by the respected Cochrane Collaboration.
The research involved selecting various studies from 817 on beta-carotene, vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E, and selenium which the team felt were the most likely to fairly reflect the impact of the supplements on reducing mortality.

Science News - Sunday, April 13th

2008-04-13T10:39:00.000-05:00

When Art and Science Meet, Nanoscale Smiley Faces Abound [Slideshow]
Caltech researcher Paul Rothemund folds DNA strands into an origami of nanosize shapes and patterns.

Paul Rothemund is a computer scientist and an artist, although not necessarily in that order. Using a few DNA molecules, an atomic force microscope and a computer, he can fit the likenesses of 50 billion smiley faces into a space no bigger than a drop of water.Rothemund refers to his brew of art, biology and technology as "DNA origami," because it is created by using hundreds of short DNA strands (which Rothemund refers to as "staples") to fold much longer genetic ribbons into nanoscale shapes and patterns.

DNA origami proves that microscopic material can be controlled so that it forms specific objects. "The reason the work is exciting for [potentially] making smaller circuits," he says, "is that this resolution is roughly eight to 10 times smaller than the features in current computer chips' [at] 45 to 60 nanometers." The process of creating DNA origami allows many shapes or patterns to be crafted simultaneously (50 billion in a single drop of water), paving the way to make loads of circuits more quickly and cheaper than is now possible.

Process Behind Heart Muscle Contraction Uncovered
ScienceDaily (Apr. 12, 2008) — Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Chicago were able to control heart muscle function in a new way after discovering the previously unknown role of two enzymes in heart muscle contraction, as detailed in the April 11 cover story of the Journal of Biological Chemistry. Although in the early stages, the research provides fresh knowledge of how heart muscle functions and also holds early potential as a treatment for various heart diseases—including congestive heart failure—that is possibly less taxing on the heart than current regimens.

The First Animal On Earth Was Significantly More Complex Than Previously Believed
A new study mapping the evolutionary history of animals indicates that Earth's first animal -- a mysterious creature whose characteristics can only be inferred from fossils and studies of living animals--was probably significantly more complex than previously believed.

Earliest Step In Human Development Revealed By Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have uncovered the molecular underpinnings of one of the earliest steps in human development using human embryonic stem cells. Their identification of a critical signal mediated by the protein BMP-4 that drives the differentiation of stem cells into what will become the placenta, will be published in the April issue of Cell Stem Cell.

Science News - April 8th, 2008

2008-04-08T23:17:00.000-05:00

Darwin Was Right: Natural Selection Speeds Up Speciation
In the first experiment of its kind conducted in nature, a University of British Columbia evolutionary biologist has come up with strong evidence for one of Charles Darwin's cornerstone ideas -- adaptation to the environment accelerates the creation of new species.

First Lungless Frog Discovered
Researchers have confirmed the first case of complete lunglessness in a frog, according to a report in the April 8th issue of Current Biology. The aquatic frog Barbourula kalimantanensis apparently gets all the oxygen it needs through its skin.

Breakthrough In Biofuel Production Process
Researchers have made a breakthrough in the development of "green gasoline," a liquid identical to standard gasoline yet created from sustainable biomass sources like switchgrass and poplar trees.

Science News - April 4th, 2008

2008-04-04T22:23:00.000-05:00

Stem Cell Breakthrough Offers Diabetes Hope
Scientists have discovered a new technique for turning embryonic stem cells into insulin-producing pancreatic tissue in what could prove a significant breakthrough in the quest to find new treatments for diabetes.

DNA Building Block Creation Seen In Living Cells: Could Be Key To New Cancer Treatments
Penn State scientists are the first to observe in living cells a key step in the creation of adenine and guanine, two of the four building blocks that comprise DNA. Also called purines, the two building blocks are essential for cell replication. The findings, which will be published in the 4 April 2008 issue of the journal Science, could lead to new cancer treatments that prevent cancer cells from replicating by interfering with their abilities to make purines.

Science News - Monday, March 31st

2008-03-31T18:40:00.000-05:00

Where did viruses come from?

Ed Rybicki, a virologist at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, answers:
Tracing the origins of viruses is difficult because they don't leave fossils and because of the tricks they use to make copies of themselves within the cells they've invaded. Some viruses even have the ability to stitch their own genes into those of the cells they infect, which means studying their ancestry requires untangling it from the history of their hosts and other organisms. What makes the process even more complicated is that viruses don't just infect humans; they can infect basically any organism—from bacteria to horses; seaweed to people.

New Genomics Software Infers Ancestry With High Accuracy
Some people may know where their ancestors lived 10 or 20 generations ago, but the rest of us can learn our distant biological heritage only from our DNA. New genomics analysis software developed by computer scientists at Stanford appears far more adept than prior methods at unraveling the ancestry of individuals. A new paper describes the HAPAA system, which takes its name from "hapa," the Hawaiian word for someone of mixed ancestry.

Reason For Almost Two Billion Year Delay In Animal Evolution On Earth Discovered
Scientists from around the world have reconstructed changes in Earth's ancient ocean chemistry during a broad sweep of geological time, from about 2.5 to 0.5 billion years ago. They have discovered that a deficiency of oxygen and the heavy metal molybdenum in the ancient deep ocean may have delayed the evolution of animal life on Earth for nearly 2 billion years.

Smart Clothes: Textiles That Track Your Health

Garments that can measure a wearer's body temperature or trace their heart activity are just entering the market, but the European project BIOTEX weaves new functions into smart textiles. Miniaturised biosensors in a textile patch can now analyse body fluids, even a tiny drop of sweat, and provide a much better assessment of someone's health.

Earth Conservation - What are we doing to avoid the warm future?

2008-03-30T13:33:00.001-05:00

It is well known that our planet is going towards a warmer future, literally. As poetic as it may sound, raising our planet's temperature in one degree celsius can bring serious and devastating effects, let's not even think in raising 2 or 3 degrees.
ANY action that we as people can take to help reduce our detrimental effect over this planet will be greatly appreciated by ourselves, but most importantly by our children and grand children.
For these and other reasons, world organizations such as the UN are working constantly in many fronts. One of them is to raise consciousness over the effect of Carbon dioxide over our atmosphere. Visit the website designed for the celebration of the World Environmental Day 2008 - June 5, 2008:
http://www.unep.org/wed/2008/english/

2008-03-24T11:42:00.000-05:00

As part of the Science Class, the students in the lower, middle and upper levels at San Jorge have to participate in lab activities.The lab is a place to learn, and if this happens while you entertain it's even better. Believe it, take a look at the Wiki page in the Media section to see the students from Lower 5th during their first lab practice on Friday, March 14th.

Science News - March 22nd, 2008

2008-03-22T11:45:00.000-05:00

Skulls Of Modern Humans And Ancient Neanderthals Evolved Differently Because Of Chance, Not Natural Selection
New research led by UC Davis anthropologist Tim Weaver adds to the evidence that chance, rather than natural selection, best explains why the skulls of modern humans and ancient Neanderthals evolved differently. The findings may alter how anthropologists think about human evolution.

Deadly Genetic Disease Prevented Before Birth In Zebrafish
By injecting a customized "genetic patch" into early stage fish embryos, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis were able to correct a genetic mutation so the embryos developed normally.

The research could lead to the prevention of up to one-fifth of birth defects in humans caused by genetic mutations, according to the authors.

Researchers Unmask Proteins In Telomerase, A Substance That Enables Cancer
One of the more intriguing workhorses of the cell, a protein conglomerate called telomerase, has in its short history been implicated in some critical areas of medicine including cancer, aging and keeping stem cells healthy. With such a resume, telomerase has been the subject of avid interest by basic scientists and pharmaceutical companies alike, so you'd think at the very least people would know what it is.

Upright Walking Began 6 Million Years Ago, Thigh Bone Comparison Suggests
A shape comparison of the most complete fossil femur (thigh bone) of one of the earliest known pre-humans, or hominins, with the femora of living apes, modern humans and other fossils, indicates the earliest form of bipedalism occurred at least six million years ago and persisted for at least four million years. William Jungers, Ph.D., of Stony Brook University, and Brian Richmond, Ph.D., of George Washington University, say their finding indicates that the fossil belongs to very early human ancestors, and that upright walking is one of the first human characteristics to appear in our lineage, right after the split between human and chimpanzee lineages. Their findings are published in the March 21 issue of the journal Science.

Rethinking Early Evolution: Earth's Earliest Animal Ecosystem Was Complex And Included Sexual Reproduction
Two paleontologists studying ancient fossils they excavated in the South Australian outback argue that Earth's ecosystem has been complex for hundreds of millions of years -- at least since around 565 million years ago, which is included in a period in Earth's history called the Neoproterozoic era.

Until now, the dominant paradigm in the field of paleobiology has been that the earliest multicellular animals were simple, and that strategies organisms use today to survive, reproduce and grow in numbers have arisen over time due to several factors. These factors include evolutionary and ecological pressures that both predators and competition for food and other resources have imposed on the ecosystem.
But in describing the ecology and reproductive strategies of Funisia dorothea, a tubular organism preserved as a fossil, the researchers found that the organism had multiple means of growing and propagating -- similar to strategies used by most invertebrate organisms for propagation today.

Science News - March 18th, 2008

2008-03-18T08:32:00.000-05:00

Glaciers Are Melting Faster Than Expected, UN Reports
The world's glaciers are continuing to melt away with the latest official figures showing record losses, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) announced today.

Crop Scientists Discover Gene That Controls Fruit Shape
ScienceDaily (Mar. 17, 2008) — Crop scientists have cloned a gene that controls the shape of tomatoes, a discovery that could help unravel the mystery behind the huge morphological differences among edible fruits and vegetables, as well as provide new insight into mechanisms of plant development.

First 'Rule' Of Evolution Suggests That Life Is Destined To Become More Complex
Researchers have found evidence which suggests that evolution drives animals to become increasingly more complex.

Science News - March 17th, 2008

2008-03-17T18:54:00.000-05:00

Blood Discovery: New Hemoglobin Type Found
Scientists at the University of Bonn have discovered a new rare type of haemoglobin. Haemoglobin transports oxygen in the red blood corpuscles. When bound to oxygen it changes colour. The new haemoglobin type appears optically to be transporting little oxygen. Measurements of the blood oxygen level therefore present a similar picture to patients suffering from an inherited cardiac defect. After examining two patients, the scientists now understand that the new type of haemoglobin distorts the level of oxygen measured.

Science News - March 13th, 2008

2008-03-13T20:20:00.000-05:00

Spitzer Finds Organics And Water Where New Planets May Grow
Researchers using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have discovered large amounts of simple organic gases and water vapor in a possible planet-forming region around an infant star, along with evidence that these molecules were created there. They've also found water in the same zone around two other young stars.

Life's Building Blocks From Space? Meteorites A Rich Source For Primordial Soup
The organic soup that spawned life on Earth may have gotten generous helpings from outer space, according to a new study. Scientists at the Carnegie Institution have discovered concentrations of amino acids in two meteorites that are more than ten times higher than levels previously measured in other similar meteorites. This result suggests that the early solar system was far richer in the organic building blocks of life than scientists had thought, and that fallout from space may have spiked Earth's primordial broth.

Startling Discovery About Photosynthesis: Many Marine Microorganism Skip Carbon Dioxide And Oxygen Step
A startling discovery by scientists at the Carnegie Institution puts a new twist on photosynthesis, arguably the most important biological process on Earth. Photosynthesis by plants, algae, and some bacteria supports nearly all living things by producing food from sunlight, and in the process these organisms release oxygen and absorb carbon dioxide.

Science News - March 11th, 2008

2008-03-11T23:20:00.000-05:00

Mystery Behind The Strongest Creature In The World
The strongest creature in the world, the Hercules Beetle, has a colour-changing trick that scientists have long sought to understand. New research details an investigation into the structure of the specie's peculiar protective shell which could aid design of 'intelligent materials'.

Water Filtration System in a Straw
LifeStraw makes previously contaminated water drinkable by removing bacteria and viruses.

Sometimes, it's the simplest technologies that have the greatest potential impact on people's lives. Take the Vestergaard Frandsen Group's mobile personal filtration system, otherwise known as LifeStraw. It is a powder-blue plastic tube—much thicker than an ordinary straw—containing filters that make water teeming with typhoid-, cholera- and diarrhea-causing microorganisms drinkable.

Grass Makes Better Ethanol than Corn Does
Midwestern farms prove switchgrass could be the right crop for producing ethanol to replace gasoline. Farmers in Nebraska and the Dakotas brought the U.S. closer to becoming a biofuel economy, planting huge tracts of land for the first time with switchgrass—a native North American perennial grass (Panicum virgatum) that often grows on the borders of cropland naturally—and proving that it can deliver more than five times more energy than it takes to grow it.

Science News - March 11th, 2008

2008-03-11T09:22:00.000-05:00

Major Advance In Biofuel Technology: Trash Today, Ethanol Tomorrow
University of Maryland research that started with bacteria from the Chesapeake Bay has led to a process that may be able to convert large volumes of all kinds of plant products, from leftover brewer's mash to paper trash, into ethanol and other biofuel alternatives to gasoline.

See video of bacteria changing newspaper into biofuel: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/video/zymetis.cfm

Science News - March 10th, 2008

2008-03-11T00:09:00.000-05:00

History Of Life Seen In The Structure Of Transfer RNA

Transfer RNA is an ancient molecule, central to every task a cell performs and thus essential to all life. A new study from the University of Illinois indicates that it is also a great historian, preserving some of the earliest and most profound events of the evolutionary past in its structure.

New Stem Cell Technique Improves Genetic Alteration
UC Irvine researchers have discovered a dramatically improved method for genetically manipulating human embryonic stem cells, making it easier for scientists to study and potentially treat thousands of disorders ranging from Huntington’s disease to muscular dystrophy and diabetes.

Six-legged Octopus?

2008-03-08T08:56:00.000-05:00

English marine experts have laid their hands on an octopus that's missing two of its own: a six-limbed creature that they have dubbed 'hexapus.'

Ordinarily, octopodes have eight arms and legs. And should they lose one or more in an accident, they can grow the limbs back.
Which is what makes 'Henry' -- as staffers at Blackpool Sea Life Centre in northwest England have dubbed their find -- so unique.
His missing limbs stem from a birth defect.
"If you look closer between the legs, there's webbing that attaches each of the arms together," John Filmer of the Sea Life Centre told CNN Tuesday. "You'd assume if he'd lost one of his legs in an accident, there would be space for an arm to grow back.
"But there's no space for two extra legs to grow back. That's just how he is."

Octopuses are renowned for having three hearts, blue blood and the ability to alter their skin complexion in the blink of an eye.

Academic Year 2008

2008-03-08T08:43:00.001-05:00

Welcome back students!!!
From this blog, we give you the best welcome back to classes for all the students at St. George's College from Miraflores, Lima - PERU.
This will be a new year for the Science department, with changes, improvements, and lots of novelties. Come back to this page as often as you want, it will be updated constantly for all the students that are curious and eager to read and learn about science.
Remember, this blog is linked with our Science Class Wikispace page:
http://science-learning.wikispaces.com/

Back to School

2008-03-05T21:29:00.000-05:00

As I said before, the amount of work involved in getting the school ready is astounding, and today was a good example.
As teachers we must prepare, mentalize, and get ready for all the work that will come with students for the rest of the year. We do that very enthusiastically, hoping the students feel the same way. We are sure of that.
Tomorrow will mark the start of a new year, the 2008 Academic Year in Saint George's College.
Welcome back students!!!!

Science News - March 4th, 2008

2008-03-04T08:35:00.000-05:00

Sex differences extend into the Brain
What was once speculation is now being confirmed by scientists: the brains of women and men are different in more ways than one.
Discoveries by scientists over the past 10 years have elucidated biological sex differences in brain structure, chemistry and function. “These variations occur throughout the brain, in regions involved in language, memory, emotion, vision, hearing and navigation,” explains Larry Cahill, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine.

Promising New Material For Capturing Carbon Dioxide From Smokestacks
Scientists and engineers in Georgia and Pennsylvania are reporting development of a new, low-cost material for capturing carbon dioxide from the smokestacks of coal-fired electric power plants and other industrial sources before the notorious greenhouse gas enters the atmosphere.

HIV Breakthrough: Protein That Fights Immunodeficiency Identified
A Canada-U.S. research team has solved a major genetic mystery: How a protein in some people's DNA guards them against killer immune diseases such as HIV. In an advance online edition of Nature Medicine, the scientists explain how the protein, FOX03a, shields against viral attacks and how the discovery will help in the development of a HIV vaccine.

Avalanches On Mars Photographed By NASA Spacecraft
A NASA spacecraft in orbit around Mars has taken the first ever image of active avalanches near the Red Planet's north pole. The image shows tan clouds billowing away from the foot of a towering slope, where ice and dust have just cascaded down. More information on: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/MRO/main/index.html

We can see in the image a root growing vertically and a root hair cell emerging horizontally.

How Roots Find A Route Around Obstacles In The Soil
Scientists at the John Innes Centre in Norwich have discovered how roots find their way past obstacles to grow through soil. The discovery, described in the forthcoming edition of Science, also explains how germinating seedlings penetrate the soil without pushing themselves out as they burrow.

Enormous Jurassic Sea Predator, Pliosaur, Discovered In Norway
Natural History Museum in Oslo, Norway has announced the discovery of one of the largest dinosaur-era marine reptiles ever found – an enormous sea predator known as a pliosaur estimated to be almost 15 meters (50 feet) feet long.

Liquid Water Found Flowing On Mars? Not Yet
Liquid water has not been found on the Martian surface within the last decade after all, according to new research. The finding casts doubt on the 2006 report that the bright spots in some Martian gullies indicate that liquid water flowed down those gullies sometime since 1999.

Key To Life Before Its Origin On Earth May Have Been Discovered
An important discovery has been made with respect to the mystery of "handedness" in biomolecules. Researchers led by Sandra Pizzarello, a research professor at Arizona State University, found that some of the possible abiotic precursors to the origin of life on Earth have been shown to carry "handedness" in a larger number than previously thought.

Key Molecular Basis Of Cystic Fibrosis Identified Through Computer Simulations
Researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have identified a key molecular mechanism that may account for the development of cystic fibrosis, which about 1 in 3000 children are born with in the US every year. The findings add new knowledge to understanding the development of this disease and may also point the way to new corrective treatments.

Almost Back to School

2008-03-02T14:09:00.001-05:00

It is Sunday, staring tomorrow and continuing the whole week, all schools in Peru will start their regular activities for the Academic year of 2008.
I have been able to witness from the backstage the impresswive amount of preparation, dedication, hard-work and excitement that going back to school means from the school's perspective.
All school personnel and teachers, prepare for a while before going back to the classrooms. Each year n new challenge brings us the questions: What's new for this year?, How will I present all the information there is available?, Ho much can all of us improve and learn from new experiences?
All of these questions are just an anticipation of the new year in the classroom.
I can say with lots and lots of confidence, that the academic year of 2008 will open up new possibilities and roads to teaching, practice and acquire more than information, but an experience of learning from students and from teachers.

Smart BOARDS

2008-02-26T20:11:00.000-05:00

San Jorge School has acquired the latest supportive technology in classroom education. These devices are called Smart BOARDS. These boards are highly-interactive, fully-supportive tools for the classroom.

The Smart Boards will be located in several areas of the school. One of them has been set up in the Science Laboratory. It will be there to support teachers in showing and interacting with all the information that contemporary science has to offer: pictures, animations, videos, etc. Everything with a simple touch.

I'm sure the students will be thrilled when they see and appreciate the benefits of these tools in action during their regular classes.

The teachers at San Jorge School have received training to learn how to excel in the use of these boards, and to take advantage of the extensive tools, software and applications that the Smart Boards have to offer.

Integrative Project: "Scientific Minds in Action"

2008-02-26T20:01:00.001-05:00

Last year, San Jorge School organized the integrative project called "The Reading Plan". For this year, the integrative project is called "Scientific Minds in Action".

The first meeting for this project to be presented on August 28th and 29th of this year was held this morning with the science teachers.

Consecutive meetings will be held in the coming days and weeks in order to organize and plan all the guidelines, topics and activities that each grade will have to present for the central days.

The purpose of this year is to integrate all the areas of knowledge into the scientifc point of view according to grades of study, which will soon receive all the topics to be developed by the groups of students. This activity will challenge the creativity of students to involve all the areas of knowledge dictated at school.

We have high hopes for all the production that will come from those Scientific Minds in Action.

We'll keep you informed!

Life Images - Miscellanium

2008-02-21T11:54:00.000-05:00

This is a video creation from the teacher training at San Jorge School.

Science News - Feb 20th, 2008

2008-02-20T08:31:00.000-05:00

Identical Twins Not As Identical As Believed

Contrary to our previous beliefs, identical twins are not genetically identical. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080215121214.htm

Genome of Marine's Organism tells of Human's Unicellular ancestors

The newly sequenced genome of a one-celled, planktonic marine oganism, is already telling scientists about the evolutionary changes that accompanied the jump from one-celled life forms to multicellular animals like ourselves.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080214144412.htm

Warming Waters may make Antarctica Hospitable to Sharks

It has been 40 million years since the waters around Antarctica have been warm enough to sustain populations of sharks and most fish, but they may return this century due to the effects of global warming. If they do, the impact on Antarctic ecology could be serious.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080217220939.htm

Science News - Feb 13th, 2008

2008-02-13T23:29:00.000-05:00

Bats Flew First, Developed Echolocation Later, Fossilized Missing Link Shows

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080213121444.htm

Thousands Of Humans Inhabited New World's Doorstep For 20,000 Years

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080213090524.htm

'Junk DNA' Can Explain Origin And Complexity Of Vertebrates, Study Suggests

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080211172609.htm