Why I Won't Be Teaching Creationism in My Classroom

Ever since the Bill Nye/Ken Ham debate I've been kind of on edge.

I am a science teacher, and I spent years learning about how the world around us functions.  I am also a Mormon, and I've spent my whole life trying to gain a personal understanding of how God functions.

In about a month I'll begin teaching my students about evolution.  I will give them the evidence scientists have found over the years and I'll encourage them to research the information for themselves.  I will not be teaching creationism.

Even though it confuses me (and frustrates me when they speak out against evolution), I have no problem with people who believe in Creationism.  If you have your facts straight and you still choose to not believe, go on with your bad self.  I don't care.  My problem is when you try to force it into school curriculum.

See, scientists are not content with "I don't know."  One of their biggest goals in life is to better understand how something works; whether it's the transcription and translation of DNA, the reasons behind earthquakes, or how fast a feather will fall, they strive to learn more.  It goes against their nature to say, "this happens because of unknown forces that we can never understand."  If I'm trying to teach my students the nature of science, why would I ever say, "here's the evidence we have, but there's also the option of going back in time before you knew any of this and just saying we have no idea how it works?"

From my experience, that is pretty much what Creationism is.  A whole lot of "I don't know, and I don't care to find out," all because they're okay with keeping the workings of God a mystery.

Isn't that kind of against what God wants for us though?  We read the scriptures and pray in order to better understand the mysteries of God.  The leaders of the LDS church encourage us to go out and get as much education as we can so that we can better understand the mysteries of God.  We're supposed to be hungry for information, not content with a lack of understanding.

On top of that, how would you feel is scientists treated everything that way?  "Oh, cancer.  Yeah, we're not sure how that works.  We're pretty sure it's just a punishment."  "Volcanic eruptions?  There are no signs to prepare you for those.  Nobody knows when God is going to make a volcano erupt."  "Angels fly; I'm pretty sure physics is just a philosophical discussion."  It just doesn't make sense to me.  Creationism is not a science, and it has no place in a science classroom.

And to close, some Avatar:

But Practicing Is Hard!

The Man once had a coworker who asked me the question "if you could do anything - including the stuff you're not talented enough to do right now - what would you want to do with your life?"

I told him I wanted to be a writer, and I meant it.

Writing letters, e-mails, and Facebook updates comes easy to me; it's just the beautiful stuff that is hard.  Every time I try to write something thought-provoking, it comes off as pretentious.  Not even a good pretentious; my words are vapid and fall flat.  I keep thinking that I have these great ideas for stories and then when I try to put the words down it's just...Twilight-esque.  Hard to create a novel on the grey lines of war when the only dialogue you can come up with could have been written by a twelve-year-old.

Or there are those moments of utter clarity when the words seem to flow from my fingertips so beautifully and I write for an hour or so (usually these moments happen when I'm sleep-deprived).  I get so excited about the world I'm creating, and then when I get a few hours of sleep in me I re-read my masterpiece and realize how ridiculous it is.  It's quite...well, I was going to say infuriating but that's not really it.  It's depressing.  I feel this gigantic urge to create, but I don't have the ability.

Then it hit me today; I don't practice writing.  I dabble, but I don't practice.  Barring select individuals, I'm pretty sure all greatness comes with the price of time, humiliation, and frustration until you get that stinking thing right.  I see great writers, great musicians, great artists, and I automatically assume that they just "have it;" I don't know why it never occurred to me that they "have it" due to a shed-load of work put in (heard that on Doctor Who today; decided to start using it.  Not so sure on "squeaky bum time" yet).

So, here's my plan: I'm going to write something every day.  Maybe a short story, maybe a poem, maybe a chapter of a greater plot, but I'm going to be writing.  I'll leave a sample now and maybe put a new one down monthly so I can track my progress.  The following story was from a sleep-deprived moment.

I walked solemnly down the dirt path.  It was dusk; dinner time.  My hand tightly clenched the wooden handle as I tried to push my feelings of guilt aside.  We needed to eat.  There was no other option.

The gate creaked open, causing sparrows in a nearby orchard to take flight.

As I entered the enclosure I could hear it; the sound of tens of quickened hearts thumping softly.  I knelt down and wrapped my hand around one's neck.  "I'm sorry.  I really am."  Its pulse beat faster and faster as I sunk my trowel in the soft earth beside it, pushed down, and lifted the carrot from its ground.  An arrhythmic drumbeat filled my ears, then faded into silence.

The worst part of death isn't the screaming; it's feeling something's heart die in your hands and knowing that you caused it.

*Prompt taken from a student's question: Do plants have hearts?  They don't, but if they did vegetarians would still be safe - yay Soylent!

My Two Cents on Amy Glass

So everyone's all upset over Amy Glass's recent article.

I have friends violently for it and friends violently against it; I'd like to be the person in the middle.

Yup, she hated on mommy bloggers and people that get married young.  Yup, she said some hurtful things.  And...dare I say it...She made some valid points.

We definitely do have a bias when it comes to congratulations and celebrations.  When someone gets married we jump up and down in joy with them, we go to their bridal shower, bachelorette party, wedding, and reception, and we throw gifts their way almost every time.  When someone gets a new job they're really excited about or a promotion that they've been waiting on for years we smile at them, maybe go out for a celebratory dinner, and then forget about it.

I realize that comparing marriage to a job promotion may seem like comparing sprouts to actual food, but here's the plain truth:

Not every woman WANTS to be a mother.  Not every woman WANTS to get married.  Some women truly, honestly, cross-their-hearts-and-hope-to-die LOVE their careers and feel very fulfilled with their choices in life.  And why shouldn't they?  We are individuals.  We are unique.  We have different desires and life goals.  And sometimes we're stupid and we look down on other people for not having the same life goals.  Amy did it to mommies and mommies did it to Amy.  Not cool on either front, but there you have it.

Maybe we should take a different approach.  Maybe instead of hating Ms. Glass for being a career-driven woman, we could put ourselves in her shoes.  How many of you congratulate your female friends with successful jobs?  How many of you tell single women things like, "oh, I can't wait until you have a boyfriend so we can double-date!"  Can you imagine how much that sucks?  I know for a fact that I'm guilty of being a biased congratulator (not a real word, but roll with it).  I'll briefly congratulate friends on promotions or new jobs, but for someone whose big life goal is to be a successful businesswoman to be constantly ignored in favor of puking babies and sickly-sweet engagement photos...It must be terrible.  I totally understand why she would lash out like that.

We need to recognize that it's okay for people to have different goals, and we need to be excited for what they achieve instead of what we think they should be achieving.  I have some amazing friends who are stellar at academia and in the workforce, and I never tell them how impressive they are to me.  I'm kind of grateful to Ms. Glass for reminding me to do so.

A Teacher's Thoughts on Common Core

I teach the Common Core.  I technically teach to the test (but I try to throw some more substance on that core).  No, it's not the best solution, and no, I'm not the biggest fan of national testing, but you know what?  I've decided that at this moment in my life I'm going to push my dislike out of my head.

Yes, I know, the worst things happen when good people do nothing (or whatever that saying is), but here's the thing: the more I hate on common core, the more the hate becomes ingrained in my head.  The more the hate becomes ingrained in my head, the more likely it is to come out when I'm talking to my students.  The more it comes out when I talk to my students, the more likely they will be to decide that school is a waste of time because of stupid legislation and just stop trying.  And I don't want that to happen.

Common Core DOES have good sides.  It can be very helpful for first-time teachers who have no idea what curricula they should be teaching for their classes.  It states very clearly what is expected, what vocab words you should use, when you can stop for testing, and all that jazz.  As a first-time teacher I can attest to the fact that we need all the help we can get.  I flounder sometimes even WITH the common core; I can't imagine what I would be like if I had no skeletal structure to go off of.

I can't attest for the other subjects, but I know that in science, at least, your students are learning a lot of good things.  Common Core asks students to explain answers deeper, defend their arguments, analyze charts and graphs, and search for reliable sources.  It covers everything that I remember learning in high school courses when Common Core was just a pipe dream.

Maybe you're better than me.  Maybe you can fight Common Core in your local government and then turn around to your kid and say that school is awesome and they should keep working hard and trying.  If you're not better than me though...what they hear you say affects them.  Most adolescent opinions are formed from listening to their parents.  If you think they're learning nothing in school THEY will think they're learning nothing in school and they'll tune off.  If you think their math is far too difficult THEY will think their math is too difficult and they'll give up and zone out.  This makes it all the more difficult for teachers like me who are trying our darnest to get students excited about learning.  

So yeah, I'll nod my head in agreement when you start railing on the national standards, but I'd rather not talk about it at all.  I'd rather try my best to be a good teacher, and there is SO much more to being a teacher than knowing your content.

MOAR!!!!

I am a bone fide certified adult, and I have no idea what I want to do with my life.

Growing up I always had this sure plan of what I was going to be: a vet, a firefighter, a massage therapist, a zookeeper, et cetera.  At those times in my life I was 100% sure of my path in life; what I would be doing and how I would get there.  What I wouldn't give to have that clarity now.

See, I followed that path.  I did the college thing and the student teaching thing and I even skipped the difficult public schools and got a job right in a charter school like I wanted (technically still a public school).  I love 2/3 of the subjects I'm teaching, and the third is sometimes fun.  I got married, have an apartment, own a cat that lives in a different state...My path has led down a dang sunny trail.

I'm not sure if it's a trait all humans have or if I'm just a little too wanderlusty, but just like Ariel, I want more.  I get bored when I fall into routines and patterns.  Problem is, I'm not all that sure what "more" is.

Sometimes "more" is a change in scenery.  I have moved...over 10 times in my life (not counting moving back home over school breaks).  I liked moving.  Then again, that was back when I could fit all my belongings in the back of a small sedan.  It's a bit harder to pack up a two-bedroom apartment into a car.  It wasn't even just moving though; I've been known to get bored and arrange spontaneous road trips just to get out of town for a while.  I like exploring - maybe I could pick that up again.  

Sometimes "more" is a new look.  A new haircut, a new jacket, a new outfit; something to make me feel like I've evolved a bit in my style.  As great as it is being dependable and having one personality, I like feeling a little more [professional, punk, stylish, attractive] every once in a while.

Sometimes "more" is new knowledge.  I LOVE reading, and the internet sucks me in so easily when I try to catch up on what's going on in the world around me.  I miss going to classes.  Not being in school, but going to classes and learning something new every single day.  It was awesome.

Sometimes "more" is hobbies.  I dabble in exercising and cooking, and I recently decided to start flexing my musical muscles again.  We'll see how that goes.  Hobbies make me feel special, they give me goals, and they give me confidence in my abilities.  I just need to use them more...

"More" for me is just...change.  My own evolution in the quest to find fulfillment.

I'm not sure I'll ever be satisfied, and I'm not sure that's such a bad thing.  I still find joy in life.  I'm still grateful for the blessings I have.  I just know I can do and be more.

What do you think?  Is it bad to always want more?

I Like Big [Families] and I Cannot Lie

I come from a large family.  Large in height, large in noise, and large in number.  It's a little crazy coming home to visit - we had fourteen people for Christmas without any extended family at all (granted, I am counting my baby nephew as a person because that makes it seem crazier).

I never liked having a big family while I was growing up.  This trip home both my mum and my little sister brought that up, and for the life of me I couldn't remember WHY I didn't like having a big family; I just didn't like it.  Maybe it was the lack of privacy (ha, my brain said prih-va-see as I typed that - dang Doctor Who), maybe it was the constant noise, or maybe it was just because I was a teenager and I hated everything.  Now that I'm older though, I love my big family.  I can't imagine it any other way.

In a big family you always have friends.  Growing up, my best friend was my older brother.  He and I did everything together, and did so until he left on his mission and I went ahead and got married.  Now I would say my best friends are The Man, my little sister, and that same older brother.  I hang out with them more than any friend from school, work, or church.  We have history together - inside jokes, stories from when we were kids, common interests and ideals...I love the relationship I've got with my siblings.  I'm not saying it's impossible to have sibling best friends in small families; it just seems like the odds are higher when you've got a ton to choose from :P

In a big family you get insight to how different people really are.  I mean, I have the same parents as my siblings, I've lived in the same places, had the same consequences and rewards, attended the same schools and had the same teachers, and yet we all turned out tremendously different.  My family includes a super-intelligent medical student who's always been very motivated and responsible, a super-introverted but secretly funny artist, a teacher, a bleeding heart who loves studying cultures and different lifestyle choices, a super-conservative gun-toting, truck-driving entrepreneur, a nerdy and lovable gamer/engineer/architect, and three more personalities that are just barely starting to emerge.  We are so different, and it's totally true that if you treat us EQUALLY none of us will be treated FAIRLY.  We all have different needs and ideals and it's not fair to treat us the same.

In a big family you learn that nothing is ever going to go perfectly, and you've got to roll with the punches.  Tonight, I really wanted to take my younger siblings to go see "Frozen."  We all got ready, packed into the car, and drove the 45 minutes to the theater only to discover that the show was sold out.  Instead of making it a huge deal, we treated it like an adventure - we got to visit two movie theaters in one night!  We drove over to the dollar theater, got into a movie that had started 20 minutes before (and was a totally different movie from the one we had come down from the cabin to see), and still had a fun time.  Sure, the house isn't always clean and the meals aren't always gourmet and the plans don't always go as we'd like, but we're used to it.  Life isn't about perfection; it's about enjoying the experience.

In a big family you learn to apologize.  As a Mormon, I believe that the family I'm with right now is the one I'm going to be with forever, and forever is a long time to be giving the silent treatment.  The belief that I'm going to be with these people forever helps me get over petty arguments and insensitive comments quite quickly, and that skill has transferred over to my relationships with other people because I've done it so much with my siblings.

In a big family you learn how to have fun without electronics.  It's hard for nine kids to share a Nintendo.  Possible, but hard.  This Christmas break we've played tons of board games, crab-raced, Weeble-Wobble Wrestled (my dad came up with it - you pretty much cross your legs and arms, wobble around on your ischia, and try to knock each other over), played chicken feet with an exercise ball, debated politics, sang together, put on an irreverent nativity play, and much more.  Sure, we've played video games too, but if the power went out we wouldn't have been bored.

I love my big family so much.  We are loud and crazy and active and funny and coming home just gets better and better each time.  It's crazy watching my little siblings become actual people with ideas and thoughts, but I love it.

The Man's always saying that he wants a big family, and I finally get it.  Big families are awesome.

I Think I'm Obsessed with My Hair

So I've discovered something: for me, hair makes all the difference in the world.

This is coming from a girl who's tried on quite a few different hairstyles.

When I was younger I had one hairstyle: a bob.  That's all my mum would let me have because apparently I looked so darn adorable in it.

SO darn adorable.

As I grew older and reached my rebellious stage (that came when I was about 5 and lasted into college), I decided that I had had enough of the bob.  I felt childish and chubby (and let's face it; if that picture above is anything to go off of, I was chubby), and it was time to grow up and grow out (hair, not tummy).  I grew out long, luscious...ok, who am I kidding?  My hair was long and thin and flat.  The end.

Long.  Luscious.

It made me feel more grown-up though.  I could wear pony-tails.  I could braid my hair (didn't know how to).  I could curl my hair (nah, doesn't hold a curl worth crap).  I could...Wear it down.  Every.  Single.  Day.  It got kind of boring.  And when I get bored, I like to change my hair.  So I spent many a year as a redhead.  Then when I was leaving for college I went insane: bangs.

If you're a meme fan, imagine Neil Tyson deGrasse here.
I can't put the accompanying words.

And then, in the prime of my life when I should have wanted to look as attractive as possible, I decided to do this:

My thoughts while taking this picture?
"Oh crap oh crap oh crap oh crap."

This was my dad's favorite hairstyle on me, because it led to an awkward incident where a cop pulled over my mother for speeding while I was in the car and mistakenly thought we were lesbian partners.  So...that was different.  It ended up being my least favorite hairstyle because it led to every guy I was interested in thinking I was attracted to girls.  Which makes dating difficult.  Plus, I do not have the nose for short hair.  Just no.  I messed with it as it grew out; trying different colors, different textures, different hats...

I used to think I was a Beatles fan.  And a rocker.  Turns out both were incorrect.

It was like puberty all over again.  All awkward-growing-out phase.  All the time.  I always felt unattractive, and I got bored with my hair weekly.  And yet, I miss it from time to time.  I look back at my past with rose-colored glasses and miss that ridiculous hair.  Is this a metaphor?  Maybe.  

No.  No, it's not.

Really though, this is the longest I've had it since 2007.
It's weird.