At the Digital Media and Learning Conference last weekend, one of the most powerful sessions was a talk on an "ecological view of equity" by Dr. Nichole Pinkard, founder of the Digital Youth Network in Chicago. Dr. Pinkard's talk was shaped and framed by the legacy of Brother Mike Hawkins, an educator, activist and spoken …
I’m jumping on a flight to LA for the Digital Media and Learning conference this weekend. But I am so so excited about our new “Color of Life” exhibit at the California Academy of Sciences. Opening June 12, “Color of Life” explores how living things use color to attract, hide, repel, and deceive. I just got …
Yesterday, in the California Academy of Sciences there was a buzz of excitement about a very rare occurrence in our swamp tank: one of our five alligator snapping turtles had managed to get onto the heated rock in the middle of the swamp! A turtle on a rock, big deal, you might say. Well, if …
Tonight I had the pleasure of visiting the amazing maker space at the software design company Autodesk on Pier 9, San Francisco. I was participating in a Bay Area Maker Educator meetup, along with 40 other teachers and education specialists from across the Bay. The invitation promised a visit to a maker lab that “we’ll all …
In just a couple of weeks, The Mix at the San Francisco Public Library is opening! The Mix is a youth-designed teen center open just for teens (ages 13-18) to hang out, explore technologies, work together, and learn from educators from around the Bay Area, including the California Academy of Sciences, the Bay Area Video …
I'm excited to share the news that episode one of the podcast "Object Oriented" is now out! As a reminder, "Object Oriented" is a monthly audio podcast featuring my friends Barry Joseph, head of digital learning at the American Museum of Natural History, Eve Gaus of digital learning at the Field Museum in Chicago, and myself. Each episode, we talk about a …
California Academy TechTeens Kate, Victoria and Emma created this video project inspired by the "Habitat Earth" planetarium show. They asked our visitors whether they thought if was possible for humans to get to zero waste. Here's what they found out. For more about the TechTeens see http://www.calacademy.org/techteens . For more about San Francisco's Zero Waste initiative, …
Playlist of all youth-created Science Today videos.
For Mother's Day yesterday, the @calacademy twitter account reposted a pic from our swamp that I took. Classic. “Are you my mom?” Sometimes things get a little awkward in our Swamp. (Captured by @riktheranger.) pic.twitter.com/MgC2O0fFvJ — CA AcademyOfSciences (@calacademy) May 10, 2015
Cal Academy research fellow Bryson Voirin is studying the adorable, elusive pygmy sloth, a critically endangered species that can be found on just one small island in the Caribbean. I love how he has to "race" to catch them! More about pygmy sloths and their endangered status on the WWF site. More about Bryson's research …