Science Teacher of the Year Award

Do not be fooled by the title. I am so far from such an accomplishment that it is frightening.

Today was one of those gloriously humbling days when life happens in the classroom. I am finding that those happen just about every day these days. We have been beyond blessed to receive some incredible science materials from a couple of my sweet Xavier friends (We love you Meg and JK!), and the crew has loved working with them so far. We have been studying the states of matter and their properties, and so we have been using our new beakers, test tubes, pipettes, scales, and science goggles for all sorts of different investigations. We are learning about science safety along the way, and so we have been using our safety goggles even when it seems completely unnecessary. Better safe than sorry....

...is the motto I should have had today when we were combining different liquids to continue our study of density. I pulled samples of many common household liquids (milk, oil, lemon juice, vinegar, cranberry juice, and others) and we chose different combinations to see how the densities of each compared. We got quite curious towards the end of our day and decided to combine milk, lemon juice, and perfume to see how the solution would settle out (the liquid with the greatest density settled to the bottom. duh.). This overly-cautious "let's just use the safety goggles so we can feel extra sciency and official"teacher must not have been thinking too clearly. Before I knew it, my shaking of the solution (which was in a stoppered test tube...in all fairness) became a bit too over zealous.

Yes...on the one day we haven't worn safety goggles, I sprayed milk/lemon juice/perfume in my eye. Not on my shirt. Or the table. Or even on my face. In my eye. Like a buffoon.

Woof.

After I could get the laughing to subside--and perhaps that one tiny voice of momentary concern--it turned into a great lesson on the importance of science safety. I meant to do it. I swear. :/


**But on a lighter, more joyful, note--Today's lesson was another great Engligh learning opportunity. My sweet English learning lady had the dardest time figuring out why I was asking if one the liquids could dance better than the others. "Like...what kind of dancing does it do?" I guess dance and dense sound a whole lot alike. Her questions sure lightened the mood after the repulsive-concoction-in-the-eye-incident. That and the choral singing of "Everybody dense now" and "I wanna dense with somebody". Never a dull moment. God is good!