January 2012 - Posts

New Jersey versus General Ripper


31 January 12 08:15 PM
I realize that this is going to push me on wrong side of the angels, but really, folks, take a good hard look at the wheelsbefore jumping on any bandwagon. Even a stopped clock is right twice a year. Yep, a reprint, but New Jersey's under attack by do-gooding, Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 3 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

Truth


28 January 12 08:50 PM
A drum found on the edge of the Delaware Bay. Grace God, I know nothing, my sense is all nonsense, And fear of You begins intelligence; Does it end there? For sexual love, for food, For books and birch trees I claim gratitude, But when I grieve over the Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 13 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

Breathing biology


23 January 12 07:36 PM
We got beans growing in our classroom. Three gorgeous rattlesnake pods hanging from a vine, the soft purple puff of a flower between the second and third bean. Most of the stuff that makes up these beans is carbon dioxide, much of it from the breath of Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 3 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

,

Food is not energy


22 January 12 08:36 AM
A response to a response to my last post--NASA, food is not energy. Language matters, especially to young children trying to make sense of the world. I remember being utterly confused as a child thinking that Karl and Groucho were the same guy--how dangerous Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 4 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

,

,

,

,

Open letter to elementary school teachers everywhere


21 January 12 06:38 PM
Dear Elementary School Teachers and Principals, I know you have an impossible job, and I know you're getting hammered from 73 different angles, and I know the last person you need to hear from is another high school teacher sitting on his throne blaming Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 5 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

A scatalogical myth


18 January 12 07:11 PM
"In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Genesis 3:19 KJV I teach high school biology. I happen to love teaching, and I enjoy Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 2 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

Seeing thro' the eye...


12 January 12 09:18 PM
We are led to believe a lie When we see not thro' the eye, Which was born in a night to perish in a night, When the soul slept in beams of light. William Blake I found the light above after it passed through the multiple lenses of a horseshoe crab that Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 3 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

,

National Canine Latin Barking assessments


11 January 12 09:00 PM
While immersed in the Krebs cycle in mid-January, pushing biochemical pathways on sophomores who have yet to learn chemistry, I marvel at their persistence, trying to grasp what I know they cannot, but I ask them to do it anyway. (There is something unethical Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 2 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

Oh, dear, New Hampshire, too?


09 January 12 09:32 PM
"I want the full portrait of evolution and the people who came up with the ideas to be presented. It's a worldview and it's godless....Columbine, remember that? They were believers in evolution. That's evidence right there." Rep. Jerry Bergevin, New Hampshire Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 3 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

Clamming: a 21st century skill


08 January 12 09:57 AM
19th century version: Yesterday I headed for one of my favorite places with one of my favorite people to do one of my favorite things--clamming. The moon is waxing and near full, so I knew low tide would fall in the early afternoon. COST: months of intermittent Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 4 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

,

It's called biology for a reason


05 January 12 09:08 PM
I'm a pretty good teacher--I can train a young H. sapiens to recite the Calvin cycle in such a way that everyone, including the young H. sapiens , believes that she actually knows something. That same young H. sapiens can graduate high school without Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 1 Comments    

Watch the wheels....


03 January 12 08:24 PM
I've ridden motorcycles on and off (always better on than off) for over thirty years. While a few things are annoying--bugs in the teeth, bits of rotting roadkill kicked up by a car, the unexpected downpour--the joys far outweigh the negatives. The one Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 3 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

Card carrying member of The Anti-Anthropomorphizing League of Rational Thinkers


01 January 12 05:46 PM
A repost. Hey, it's my blog.. . In Galway Bay, nestled on the west coast of Ireland, lives Fungi, a lone male dolphin who seeks the company of humans, as he has for over a quarter century now. He's a tourist attraction, and an enigma. No one knows why Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 1 Comments    
Filed under:

,

,

,

A science teacher's resolutions


01 January 12 11:09 AM
Say a prayer every morning honoring a mystery. A prayer for light, for life, for gravity, for cosmic rays, for the source of water. I pretend I know nothing. I want to know what knowing nothing really means. Remind myself every morning, when I wake up, Read More...
Postedfrom doyle | 4 Comments    
Filed under: