Citizen Scientist Rising: Why and 17 Great Places to Start

Mr. Robbo the PE Geek is an excellent blogger and incredible teacher. Located in remote Australia, he has these students using heart monitors and high definition cameras to understand their sport. (Read his It's Now Possible blog post from today. This PE teacher taught me about QR Codes. A neat person too.)

We can talk about getting kids interested in science, however, science is interested IN them because it can unlock higher performance in the things they love. Taking science to the ballfield is only the beginning

For those of you who saw my Daily Education & Technology News For Schools this morning know that I'm having a bit of a traipse into Citizen Science.

Citizen Science is Becoming “Legitimate” Science
Authentic citizen scientist research work is becoming very useful to high level scientists. When I sat down with Dr. Geoffrey “Jess” Parker from the Smithsonian last year and the Microsoft Innovative Educator Forum in South Africa, he said that it is pretty easy to use statistical analysis to filter out “noise” of readings that have been taken in err.

Joshua Faulk helps students Treeband in south Africa at St. Cyprian's. Photo by Vicki Davis.

Dr. Parker is the scientist who discovered that trees in Maryland are growing faster than predicted. He and fellow scientist Joshua Faulk and the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center have partnered with Taking IT Global and Microsoft to create Shout Learning and the Smithsonian Tree Banding project where your students can participate.

Here are some important reasons you should have citizen science as part of your curriculum:

• It introduces students to the scientific method and data collection responsibilities.
• It introduces students to live science in action and makes it real. They can see questions before they have been answered and understand how science moves forward.
• It adds meaning to their work. No longer answering the same questions answered hundreds of years a go, they are answering questions that help our world NOW! You and your classroom MAKE A Difference. (The principle of glocalization talked about in Thomas Friedman's work – Think globally act locally.)
• As in the case of Mr. Robbo's lesson plan, they can use science to improve their performance which can show benefits on the field and also in their life as they realize science is in them, around them, everywhere.
• It is project based learning in action and can lead to other cross curricular activities including math, writing reflections, technology (using spreadsheets) and more.

http://scienceforcitizens.net/