Second Journal Entry

During the past several weeks, I have been working with Ms. Seng Her helping to instruct K5 and 8th grade students in their studies of life sciences. I feel that I'm suited particularly well for the material that we cover as my major at UW-M has been biological sciences and that correlates well with life sciences (Biology = study of life). The 8th graders have been working on Rube-Goldberg machines that must have 15 steps to create a particular reaction. My involvement has been demonstrating the physical concepts of momentum and potential energy. Working with these students has not only been rewarding, but good for me, too, while the topics that come up reinforce what I have learned in physics I&II at UW-M. Of course, teaching these concepts doesn't involve deriving many complex formulas, but it doesn't have to. Working with the K5 group (kindergarteners) has also been a pleasure. I'm not really sure if it was them or myself who had the most fun making play-dough or mixing baking soda and vinegar (acetic acid) together to produce carbon dioxide gas and sodium acetate salt. The K5s are a fun bunch to work with, and are so inquisitive -- questions such as, "Mr. John, why do you wear glasses?" put a smile on my face because it means that they are willing and eager to learn about the world around them. Also, it was pretty awesome that I was offered a summer job teaching!