Local schools turned into ‘Ice Worlds’
Elementary students in the Brownsville Area School District recently rocketed to Mars, flew through the rings of Saturn, steered a submarine ship in the Antarctic and traveled to the North Pole. How was that possible?
Through “Ice Worlds,” a Carnegie Museum of Natural History outreach program brought into Cardale, Central and Cox-Donahey schools in October.
Kerry Handron, director of the museum’s Earth theater, described the program as “an important piece of understanding the Earth’s climate” and one that teachers can connect to concepts being taught in the classroom.
The excitement and curiosity of students about the program increased two-fold once they saw the 11-foot, inflatable igloo in which they viewed the movie.
Inside, 3-D images appeared on the dome-shaped igloo’s walls and ceiling, eliciting cries of “aw” and “wow” as a polar bear stomped one, fur-covered paw directly above their heads and dozens of cold-water krill swam away from a large blue whale looking to feed on them.
“It was very fun and cool,” said Cardale Elementary fifth-grader Zachary Colgan, one of approximately 150 district students who viewed the movie. “It told us why ice is important.”
The movie delivered the message that the polar ice caps are ever changing and a long-term thinning and shrinking of the northern ice cap is under way.
The Earth is in a warming period that has accelerated in the last few years and could be linked to an increase in carbon dioxide since the industrial revolution, according to the movie’s narrator.
Travel for people living in a village near the mountains of Greenland is different now. Boats have replaced dog sleds as a mode of transportation, a small sign of greater change, according to the narrator.
Ice also exists in space, including on Mars, Haley’s comet and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, so much so that the solar system’s ice worlds vastly outnumber the number of planets, according to the narrator.
Only by taking the appropriate action can the world remain a truly hospitable place for its people and creatures, the narrator concluded.
Lynne Reed, district gifted support teacher, arranged for the program to be brought into the schools. She said it came at no charge to the district.
“I am so excited,” said Reed, noting that future Carnegie Museum programs could come to the middle and high schools. “Because of (the district’s) financial status, little funding is available for such programs. +As a teacher, I was surprised to see we have this opportunity available. Instead of us going to Pittsburgh, the Carnegie Museum outreach program came to us.”
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) received a grant through the National Science Foundation, a U.S. government agency that funds science and engineering research and education, to enable the program to be brought to area schoolchildren. Handron said she has given the presentation to around 30 area schools throughout the last year.
Handron said the movie provided a glimpse into the winter season, the role of the Earth’s climate and the fact that ice is “not only in our world, but is elsewhere in the solar system” – items important in the elementary school curriculum, she said.
NASA wanted to create environmental programming that “caught people’s attention and talked about climate change,” Handron said.
“If not for ice, the planet would be much warmer,” Handron said.
The presentation also correlated with International Polar Year, an international effort to research the Earth’s polar regions. The research effort first occurred in 1882 and again in 1932 and 1957.
The latest research, a two-year effort that ended in March, involved more than 200 projects with thousands of scientists from more than 60 nations examining physical, biological and social research topics, according to the International Polar Year Web site at www.ipy.org.
Dr. Philip Savini, Brownsville Area School District superintendent, who attended one of the presentations, observed, “The kids did a great job at listening and asking questions, a lot of which were analytical.”
Frank Berdar, principal of Cardale Elementary School, said he felt the presentation “gave the students a learning experience different from what they are used to in their regular classrooms.
“While it tied into what they are learning in their everyday classrooms, it also provided them an opportunity to be transported to another place and feel as if they were experiencing the adventure firsthand,” said Berdar. “The students really enjoyed the entire experience and have asked when the ‘igloo’ is coming back.”
Reed said the district is open to having the museum bring other educational programming into the schools. She may have the opportunity to do so in the near future.
Handron is developing another, interactive presentation that will give students a glimpse of ancient Egyptian temples and hieroglyphics.
“Whales/Tohora,” which explores whale anatomy, evolution and the cultural and spiritual connection the people of New Zealand have to whales, is the museum’s current featured program. A related exhibition will be on display until May.