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Ok, Ben, I'll stick my neck out and ask: "What the heck does 'doing
meaningful science' look like to an eight year old?" There was a
memorable keynote given 8-10 years ago at an ASTC conference (in
Phoenix?) that posited 18 month olds and scientists have much more in
common than one might suspect. If I remember correctly (and I'll
leave it to others to correct me), the central theme was constructing
the universe, so to speak.....
I also had the good fortune to go to an early learning conference
many years ago at Stanford with Sally Duensing. A researcher
presented raw video that had been shot in early elementary school of
a teacher taking kids through 'experiments.' Afterwards, the room
nearly erupted, the most common refrain being, "That's not science!"
To which the researcher replied, "I know, I know....don't shoot the
messenger, I'm just trying to figure out what it is....."
I know this latter example is more a critique of that particular
teacher's understanding, or, in this case, mis-understanding, of
children doing science....
I have a 7 year old - while I can tell you he engages in
experimenting all the time, constructing his on universe as it were,
some of the most fundamental constructs of 'doing science' are simply
beyond his developmental level.
I'm not challenging your thesis, I'm just suggesting it is very
dependent on your framework for what science is.....
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