Millard South High School, Omaha, Nebraska (when in NITARP)
10, 11, 12
Ms. Larsen is part of the NITARP 2014 class.
Despite the global pandemic, many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2020 proposals! Scientists who helped include Tiffany Meshkat, Patrick Lowrance, Mike Werner, Seppo Laine, and Julian van Eyken. Thanks to all!
Many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2019 proposals! Scientists who helped include Tiffany Meshkat, Marja Seidel, Sergio Fajardo-Acosta, Mike Werner, and Julian van Eyken. Thanks to all!
Many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2018 proposals! Scientists who helped include Babar Ali, Calen Henderson, Tiffany Meshkat, and Julian Van Eyken. Thanks to all!
Ms. Larsen was awarded the Air Force Association, Ak-sar-ben Chapter, 2017 Teacher of the Year!
Many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2017 proposals! Scientists who helped include Chris Gelino, Marie Ygouf, Julian van Eyken, and Jessica Krick. Thanks to all!
Many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2016 proposals! Scientists who helped include Chris Gelino, Patrick Lowrance, Rafael Millan-Gabet, Charles Steinhardt, and Sean Carey. Thanks to all!
Many NITARP alumni helped us out with reviewing the NITARP 2015 proposals! Scientists who helped include B. Berriman, J. Krick, P. Lowrance, P. McGehee, R. Millan-Gabet, B. Rusholme, and J. van Eyken. Thanks to all!
The 2014 class has been announced! This year, we had many fewer spots to offer, and still 4.5 times as many educators applied as we had spots. Caroline Odden and John Gibbs will be our mentor educators for this class. Look for results of their projects in January 2015!
I had a very eye-opening experience today during our first day of school. I am teaching an AP Physics 2 (second semester college physics) with a small group of seniors. The students I took with me during the NITARP experience (Shailyn, Matt, and Ethan) are all in the class, along with a few other highly advanced students.
I decided to do a Page Keeley science probe activity with them. The activity asks the students to agree with one of the four following students about how scientists do their work:
Antoine: "I think scientists just try out different things until something works."
Tamara: "I think there is a definite set of steps all scientists follow called the scientific method."
Marcos: "I think scientists use different methods depending on their question."
Avery: "I think scientists use different methods but they all involve doing experiments."
Most of the students in the class chose Tamara due to the scientific method. HOWEVER, all three NITARP kids chose Marcos... which is the *best* response, and they were the only ones to do so.
Quotes from students' responses:
Matt said "In the case of astronomy, the scientific method does not always work.... Most astronomy is done using observations."
Shailyn said "While they push the scientific method down our throats throughout our public education, it's not exactly how things are always done... I have faced variances on the scientific method [even between teachers], so I would assume variances exist among the scientific community."
Ethan said "... Tamara is almost correct, but questions cannot all be answered in a cookie-cutter fashion... Marcos is correct because differing methods can be used to accomplish similar goals."
THAT'S THE IMPACT OF NITARP!!!!
KEEP DOING REAL SCIENCE!! Kids learn!