So this is how a traditional lesson goes:
- You start a topic from the text book and discuss the main concepts involved in class.
- You end the lesson with an open question and you ask the students to write down their thoughts for homework
- The day after, you run a class debate in which students use the arguments they have researched to go even deeper in their thoughts.
And this is a simple way to expand that into a 21st century lesson (not the best one, but let us hope it works!):
- You do all the above, and then you write a blog post on the issue and ask your students - and anyone else - to comment on it.
So here we are. The debating issue is We should stop spending money in space exploration. My Year 10 Physics students provided an interesting range of arguments, which I will try to summarise.
For:
- Money would be better spent in helping poor countries in Africa
- We have already made the most of space exploration, and we are never going to find alien life or anything like that
- We do not discuss the benefits that space exploration has brought - satellites, etc - but this is not a priority anymore.
Against:
- We do not know what else we will find out there. Space research has already brought us lots of discoveries and inventions (plasma screens, GPS, etc)
- Money not spent on space exploration would not necessarily go into helping other countries, and it probably would not be enough anyway.
- Humans are explorers by nature, and the quest for space is a challenge for us.
I hope I got things right, but I am sure my students will correct me otherwise. If any of my readers want to give their opinion on the subject, or (for teachers) bring their class in and share their thoughts, they will be more than welcome!
My students - remember to sign your comments using your initials so I know who you are!
May the force be with you…
Tags: debate, space
It is time I showed my face up on the side... but I still won't! I hope you will join me on my multi-lingual, multi-subject discussion about my classes in Madrid. A teacher is a life-long learner.
Entries (RSS)
April 16th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Hello
I hope people all around the world visit this great blog of Mr Ribas, wich I personally think is great for learnig in a fun way!!!XD
Last Wenesday we were discusing about space exploration and I think that what we have reached all ready is great!!*(Actually this message wouldnt reach you if there had not been space exploratio to create the internet, mobilie phones, GPS…etc)
But……I think we have reached as far as we can in space exploration, we have discovered a lot of planets, staras galaxies, Red giants, Black holes, White Dwarfs..etc Ok that is great, and know what? Are we ever going to have holidays in Jupiter?? Its good to know that there are a lot of planets and that there are no big nasty aliens all around us, but I insist we are not going to go much further, we may discover some new planets, and we will go on and on discovering more planets, okay they are there…who cares??!! (please dont take me wrong MrRibas) are we going to do something with them? and the answer is….NO
Im not talking about closing down space exploration, but reducing it and helping the most needed….last day MMP gave a good example, but nobody thinks about Southern Americaand some parts of Russia an Asia. We talked about the money spent in space exploration had to be spent in poverty, and, JG made the point in Millitary money should be pent in other things and not in war…..beloved JG a lot of famous people tried to do the perfect world (Mohhamed Ganhdi) and if they didnt made it.. I personaly think you wont!!XD
Also we all heard a interesting comment… FF said that if people in Africa didnt die we all have less space!!
Next Step Nazism!!
In Conclusion reduce Space Exploration and help the most needed!!
April 20th, 2008 at 4:44 pm
Space exploration has been very useful for us, as EAM has said, we wouldn’t have internet or mobile phones… we have been discovering many things through all these years, so why will this stop here? I think we have NOT reached as far as we can. The NASA has been inventing new and useful things, such as satellites, TV, even Velcro.
Space exploration has been helping us not only to discover new planets, but also to improve the development in our planet.
April 21st, 2008 at 8:12 pm
As a student of Mr.Ribas and the debates we have taken in class, and the good arguments we have been discusing I feel I need to comment on the blog. As EAM says if we hadn’t care for space exploration we wouldn’t be able to know be talking of this in the internet although he is right in that argument. We don’t know for sure if we cannot discover more in the space because its obviously that if something isn’t discovered yet nowadays we are not going to know. so we need to keep investing for space. EAM im not quite pleased with your explanation, how can you tell me we are not going to discover much more. life in other planets can be very possible and maybe we can contact with them and it will be very curious if we discover it, and to know how are they and there beginings.and if we can take some advantage to discover new things for our planet. Its also very important to know our surroundings and the stars cycle so we know at what stage we are and how more are we going to leave before human extinct, so we don’t know exactly how further we can take. remember space is still a mysterous for us. although I think that they are spending too much on it they need 16.790 million dollar more or less in a year if we reduce this money and use it for improving our planet things would be better. I always think first help the ones that are on the same planet an then search for others.maybe NASA is too blind to see that many people are dying of hunger and they are living in extremely poverty if some money was used for improving quality of those who leaves in extrem poverty and then when things are improved invest in space. Say what we say in this blog nothing will happen.
With hope this have helped something.
April 21st, 2008 at 9:22 pm
MHO actually velcro was not discovered in space it was tested there!!XD
so what will we discover next???
is there anything more to discover?? ( please dont say teleporter or time machine)
April 21st, 2008 at 10:25 pm
We know space exploration has brought many new spatial and scientific discoveries and I was just wondering why are satellitles and other advantages not considered a priority any more? If it wasnt for the advantages the space exploration has brought to us we could not be even worrying about the poor child in Africa because there would be no human method to communicate with them or to send them food and as you want to consider those people a priority then its best to consider poor people in Africa so thats the answer from my humble opinion.
April 22nd, 2008 at 7:11 pm
I agree with guillermo.
EAM, i did not say that velcro was discovered in space. I said that it was invented by the NASA.
April 22nd, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Guillermo thats why we say that now that we are using all the advantages that space exploration has brought us we should be achieving now the possibility of helping needed people as we now know in what sates they are living. we now do not consider satellites and all those thing a priority because nowadays we are use to them and as people like me and much more when they were little or even before we were borned satellites and all those things already existed so we don’t see them as an advantge although they are because for us they have been there since we were borned. New modern technology has make things space exploration discovered to achieve betters results, like for example processing information much quicker. I think that now that we know that people are living in extremly poverty we should not to stop investing but reducing money at a 50% and help other people and when thats finished to invest what they want in space.