First and second graders at Eastwood School are learning scientific principles through art and music. Teachers Sharon Blecher and Kathleen Jaffee, assisted by an Oberlin College student, are using the sculpture of Alexander Calder to teach principles of balance and motion. They bought a computer last year with money from a Howard Hughes Medical Institute grant to Oberlin College and will enhance its memory and buy more software this year. Associate professor of physics Dan Stinebring is coordinating the project.
The outreach program that puts Oberlin College science students into public-school classrooms began this year, financed by part of a $500,000 grant to the college from the Hughes institute (Observer 30 September 1993). In 1995-96 the grant will fund science projects in eight elementary- and middle-school classrooms at a total cost of $15,249. "The teachers are doing some exciting things," says professor of psychology and neuroscience Dennison Smith, who is coordinating the program. "The college students who worked in the classroom this year got a lot out of the experience."
Eastwood teachers Rachel Koch, Nancy Monaghan, and Gail Burton, assisted by two students, are creating and teaching experiments with plants. Last year's grant money bought a greenhouse; this year's will pay for additional plants. Danforth professor of biology David Benzing is coordinating this project.
Eastwood teachers Phyllis Baumann and Virginia Rogers and one or two college students will teach children to observe, record, estimate, and graph weather data. The grant money will pay for a small weather station. Assistant professor of biology Roger Laushman is project coordinator. He is also coordinating a Prospect School project: Teachers Gail Wood and Barbara Enos, assisted by one or two college students, will set up three thematic units for their third and fourth graders. With the Hughes grant they will buy a computer with a CD-ROM and educational software.
Teacher John Memmott will use several college students as advisors, mentors, and assistants to "gifted and talented" third, fourth, and fifth graders as they plan presentations for an independent-study fair. The college students will help the public-school students learn to use computers and library resources, and the grant will pay for a computer and digital camera. Smith is the college-faculty coordinator for this project and for another at Langston Middle School. There, teacher Susan McDaniel will work with a college student to develop computer-assisted science experiences for children with learning disabilities. The Hughes grant will pay for a computer and educational software.
Two other Langston teachers are developing projects for teaching general science, each assisted by a college student. Marcia Finch's sixth-grade curriculum emphasizes basic scientific reasoning, measurement, earth sciences, and biology. The Hughes grant will pay for hands-on teaching materials and Laserdisk multimedia hardware and software. Professor of geology Bruce Simonson is coordinating this project. Cheryl Krueger will lead a field trip to one of the Lake Erie islands, where her seventh graders will do various environmental assessments illustrating the practical applications of scientific principles. The grant will support the field trip and pay for additional resource materials. The project coordinator is associate professor of chemistry Michael Nee.
