Scientific Me

Sarah Lehrfeld

Throughout my life thus far, I have experienced science in many different ways, both good and bad. I feel as though my thoughts of science have changed over the years due to the teachers that I have had. This will help me to become a better science teacher. When I was younger, I would do my own science experiments at home, mostly mixing baking soda and vinegar and seeing what would happen when I mixed other ingredients into it. In elementary school I have fond memories of science. It was always fun and interactive, everything involving science was hands on.  In middle school science got more difficult and a little less hands on but I still enjoyed it. High school I when I started to lose interest in science.

My first memory of science was in 1^st grade, watching chicken eggs hatch. I remember each hour a different person got to check on the eggs to see if anything was happening and we had to log it in a book. During this process we learned about what the chicks looked like inside of the egg at that stage of its progression. Once the eggs hatched we got to watch them grow a bit and play with them which was a lot of fun. Also in 3^rd and 4^th grade we watched caterpillars turn into butterflies, and then released them. This was also enjoyable because we got to see them actually change and see the life cycle first hand. The only problem with this experiment was that many of the chrysalis fell and we lost a lot of the butterflies. In third grade we also learned a lot about rocks; I loved collecting rocks so I found this interesting. I remember after learning about them in class I would go home and look at my rock collection and try to relate them to what I had learned. I even got to bring my rock collection into class! All throughout elementary school we had a star lab come to our school and I always looked forward to it. It was a big blow up dome that would be put in the gym. We would have to climb into it through this tunnel-tube and inside it looked like a night sky. We would learn about the different constellations and how to find them. Also in elementary school, I was in a science fair where I made a light bulb light up, by creating a filament and connecting copper wires to it and a battery to it.

In middle school science was still fun because we did a lot of experiments, but it was becoming less hands on. In middle school the only topics I remember learning about were animal and human anatomy and human genes. While learning about the animal anatomy we dissected a frog. While learning about human genes we did an assignment where we had to figure out what color eyes and hair would be dominant in different circumstances.

High school is when I lost interest in science. All of my science teachers were very strict and made science extremely boring and difficult. However, when I was a junior in high school I was in an early childhood education program where I had an internship in an elementary school. During this internship I experienced different science lessons. One lesson was watching a live recording of a bird’s nest. We watched the eggs hatch live and saw what the mother did with the babies throughout the day. I also got to experience a “teachable” moment, from the teacher showing her children where salamanders live/belong. A student brought to class salamanders that they found at home. The teacher of the class brought the students outside to a small stream they had outside of the school and released the salamanders.

In college I’ve only had to take astronomy and the science class that I am currently in, exercise science and sports medicine. Astronomy was interesting but it was a very difficult course. It involved a lot of equations and terminology to remember.

Overall, I have enjoyed science both in and out of school when it was hands on. In elementary school I did fairly well in science however, as I got older and science became less hands on, it was little harder for me to understand. This made me become less successful and less interested in science.

In my opinion, science is based on hands on experiences and experiments. It’s about having students learn with their hands and their senses and making sense of the world around them.