Science should be taught to everyone so that everyone
can appreciate the complexity and beauty of nature.
Science should be taught to everyone because great
scientists can become great only if they become scientists
first.
Science should be taught to everyone because
understanding science is the key to understanding
technology. And technology has become a force in society
which, if we are not careful, will control our future.
Doing challenging work of any kind trains the brain.
Studying science provides students with an opportunity to
think deeply about complex systems. Specific skills and
concepts may or may not have long-term application but the
ability to think critically and synthesize complex
information is universally applicable.
Not every student in an art class becomes an artist. Not
every student in a science class becomes a scientist. But
everyone should learn to understand the beautiful and
everyone should learn to understand the world around them.
Science, at its best, is doubt instilled in a person as a
virtue. Certainty is stagnation: the human imagination is
no match for the imagination of nature. Nature does not
give up her secrets easily. Critical thinking and careful
comparison are essential toward building the constantly
improving models built by the methods of science.
Mr. Keller’s Motto
It’s not about what you did, it’s about what you learned.
Correct answers matter less than critical thinking. If you
think carefully, and work hard, correct answers will come.
The important thing is the thinking. If you think carefully
and reflect on your work you will see for yourself whether
your answers are correct or not. I use an acronym to summarize my thinking here: FIO. If you think about it for a few minutes, and you want to know what this stands for, you will figure it out.
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To browse all of the various things I have published have a
look at Documents Listed by Topic
Note: This is not an exhaustive list of all topics covered
or activities used.
In my courses you will be asked to write well-reasoned
scientific explanations. In other words, you will develop
correct theories about the world and write them down. Overview of
Explanations
Group Work Defined
Working in small groups to solve problems is a great way to
learn science. Here are a few documents to give group work
some shape and definition so that it can be a
self-regulating learning tool:
Students write some very funny things at times.
Sometimes they even realize it at the time. All of the quotes
on this
page are verbatim from real student papers. Names have
been withheld to protect the innocent.
This material is copyrighted but I grant permission for
in-classroom use. Please give the URL and not copies to
other teachers. Only pages directly downloaded may be used,
do not distribute paper copies. Requirement for use: send
me an email and give me feedback on your success with these
materials. See also my copyright statement.
A couple of quotes from users of this site:
“I REALLY REALLY appreciate you making your curriculum available – my first year teaching was MUCH higher quality than it would have been without your material to use as a platform.” 2014-06-23
“I wanted to express my gratitude for stumbling upon your website. As someone relatively new to AP Chemistry, I've found your resources to be nothing short of a revelation. They've provided me with a much-needed spark of inspiration and direction on how to approach planning for my lessons. Thank you immensely for the tremendous effort and dedication you've poured into creating such invaluable resources. Your work is truly appreciated.” 2024-02-10
(apparently I only receive these very occasionally)
I can be reached at this address: a k e l l e r [at] scarboroughschools . org
You will have to remove the spaces to use this
address.
Science and Pseudoscience
Inspect every piece of pseudoscience and you will find a
security blanket, a thumb to suck, a skirt to hold. What have
we to offer in exchange? Uncertainty! Insecurity!
—Isaac Asimov
Hofstadter’s Law
It always takes longer than you think it’s going to
take, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s
Law.
—Douglas Hofstadter
The Unknown
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you in
trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just
ain’t so.
—Mark Twain
Understanding the Universe
“The effort to understand the universe is one of the
very few things that lifts human life a little above the
level of farce, and gives it some of the grace of
tragedy.”
—Steven Weinberg
“Magic, as practiced by performing magicians, is the
art of making people see things that didn’t happen and
miss seeing what did. Teaching science is the art of making
students see things they never suspected to exist and
recognize when they seem to see things that do not
exist.”
