Module II

1.      I have learned that the native cultures in Alaska are extremely eager to be a part of researched based (western) science.  I did not know that the Alaska Native Science Commission even existed until today.  As I read through their link a few things really stood out to me.  One, they are trying to promote science to Native youth.  Two, promoting the hiring of local people to assist in research.  Again, I have never been exposed to the knowledge that Native communities want to be a part of the scientific research and are intensely trying to do so.  I learned that Native cultures have vocabulary words with multiple meanings and engineered such good dwellings that one could be warm while naked inside(People of the Arctic video).    I feel that revisiting the common ground of honesty and pattern recognition was important in comparing Native knowledge and Western Science.  Lastly, I learned how to start using Google Earth.  What a wonderful tool that allows students to look at our Earth from space and give a great representation that our Earth truly is one system / place that we all belong to.

2 and 3.  I will use this weeks resources by showing my students Google Earth. (earth.google.com/)  I plan on having them use the classroom laptops to explore different regions of the Earth and research some of Earth’s unique biomes.  As we continue to explore Earth’s natural cycles in my class I think that discussing subsistence ways of living can be a great avenue to using our natural resources in an ethical and sustainable manner.  If this method of living has sustained certain groups of people for thousands of years why aren’t we taking more lessons from those people?  It would be wonderful to have students do this by experiencing it first hand in addition to the standard formal education that the Western culture has brought to this part of the world.  I find the module very relevant to me and my classroom because I think of native students I have and how I can better connect with them and inspire them.  Many of today’s students learn by “rapid acquisition” with the technology they have at their fingertips.  However, I find it important to perhaps think of those students who have spent portions of their lives not in this town but in rural Alaska and are used to education being non-secular but a longer process of experiences tied together.  Also, I find it interesting to note that with current astrophysical research such like at published from Fermi lab, there is a vast array of unexplained phenomena that is occurring in our universe which both Native and Western cultures can probably relate to.

BLOG COMMENTS- I commented to the following course participants

-   Mglehe.blogspot.com had some wonderful things to say about using “both eyes” of Native and Western views to educate our students

-    explorepalmer.blogspot.com connected electron behavior to unexplained mysteries that occur with Native and Western perspectives
- kahtnu.blogspot.com has some neat pictures and views enjoying that natural landscape in his hometown