Science and gastronomi

I'm spending my holiday doing another Coursera MOOC. This one is from Hong Kong University for technology and science, and it is absolutely great. I signed up for it, because I wanted to do it with my daughter to maintain her "science thinking" during the holiday. She is quite interested in cooking, but not so much in science.

Now after having finished the second of the six weeks we are both very engaged in the course. It explains the science behind and around food, cooking, perception of taste so well and we both learned a lot. I have got so many new ideas for my future science classes. We have to do several experiments at home and send the results to the university. These experiments are very easy, illustrative and most of all interesting and funny. And it gives us plenty of ideas to experiment on in the kitchen. This week we learned about smell influence on your taste of perception. Etc how vanilla makes you think you taste sweetness. Last week we learned how tastes can suppress each other etc sweetness suppress bitterness. So in theory the smell of vanilla would make things taste less bitter. I always drink my coffee with a lot of sugar to make it less bitter. I would like to use less sugar. So I will experiment with adding vanilla flavor to my coffee. 

In the screen dump below you see one of the experiments we have to do this week: do the smell influence the taste of potato chips? I guess you can see, why we are having fun doing these assignments :)

So even though the first deadline for assignments was a few days ago, I can only recommend everybody with an interest in food, eating, recipes, cooking or science to pass by King, Lam, Leo and the rest of the team in https://www.coursera.org/course/scigast

L3 second post.

L3 first post. From the holiday in Sheffield

+Amy Burvall started the Google+ group Learning Listening Loving. The challenge is:

Make a collage of your "BIG 3" from today: 

1. What are you learning, and how? 

1. What are you listening to that really gets to you? 

1. What cool things are you obsessed about?

Here's my first post to the group

Embedding my Google map

As a part of the Google Maps Project I have to show, that I can embed a Google map by the html code. So here it is my map. Five places I would like to visit in Denmark.

PLA #1 (Module 1.1) Leaders who brought out the best of you

According to my plan I ought to be busy gardening, but the rain tumbles down and I had a short look at the module 1 videos from Inspiring Leadership through Emotional intelligence. It seems very interesting and is only estimated to a few hours a week. I should be able to do some catch up (due to the weather forecasts) within the next days. So I'll give it a try :)

Ole Hald Madsen

Ole Hald Madsen was my physic and chemistry teacher, when I studied to become a teacher. We were one of his last classes before his retirement. Ole is the name on top of my left hand column. Like Mr. Richard Boyatzis points out in the video, I don't exactly remember in details what Ole said or did, but I remember how he made me feel. I felt I could handle this subject in my own way. That it was ok to play around and asking questions about anything. I had my debut on the internet during his course, and we students could stay in the lab all night and email him questions that he would answer as soon as he saw them. Ole is clearly the reason that I found (and still do) science is one of the most interesting, meaningful and playful approaches to understand our surrounding world. He is still a great role model for me in my teaching.

On my right hand column I didn't even write a name, but just "the pompous fool from the office". Mr. Richards Boyatzis already described him in details in the video. Do I have to say more? After two months I had to quit. It made him ask why and he seemed very surprised that I did not like and understand his way of leadership. Besides crowning the right hand column he is also illustrated in the top field of the Boss/ Leadership picture below. 

Notes provided from course

Basic learning points of module 1:

1. Most of us have experienced a great leader some time in our past. This experience provided a model of great leadership which we let ourselves forget and are co-opted by poor or mediocre leaders.
2. Leadership is about the relationship between the leader and the people around him or her.
3. The best leaders build or rebuild resonant relationships. These are relationships in which the leader is in tune with or in sync with the people around him or her. 
4. Most of us have experienced a great leader some time in our past. This experience provided a model of great leadership which we let ourselves forget and are co-opted by poor or mediocre leaders.
5. Leadership is about the relationship between the leader and the people around him or her.
6. The best leaders build or rebuild resonant relationships. These are relationships in which the leader is in tune with or in sync with the people around him or her.
7. Executives reflecting on moments in their lives with specific resonant leaders activated the following neural networks in their brain: mirror neuron networks; social/Default Mode Network; networks associated with positive emotions; and networks associated with approach behavior.
8. Executives reflecting on moments in their lives with specific dissonant leaders deactivated or suppressed the following neural networks in their brain: mirror neuron networks; social/Default Mode Network about 2/3rds of the time (the other 1/3rd of the time it was activated). They activated networks associated with negative emotions and those associated with avoidance behavior. 
9. Sympathetic activations of actions and emotions of others occur in the brain of normal people around them. This occurs in parts of a second, sometimes as little as less than 100 milliseconds, and is predominantly unconscious.
10. When people engage in analytic tasks, like financial, engineering, IT, or physics problems, they activate the Task Positive Network (TPN) in their brain. The TPN enables a person to focus, solve a problem, and make a decision, but it closes a person perceptually to new ideas, possibilities and people.
11. When people engage in social tasks, like helping another person, arguing with them, asking someone for help, they activate the Social Network (SN) which is a part of the Default Mode Network (DMN) in their brain. The SN/DMN enables a person to be open to new ideas, people or emotions, tune into others and moral considerations, but might leave a person open to distractions.
12. The TPN and SN/DMN are, on the whole, independent networks, and they suppress each other. But as professionals, managers and leaders, we need to use both the TPN and SN/DMN to be effective.
13. Resonant leadership is common sense, but not common practice.

Sources: 

Boss/ Leader picture: source unknown

Ole Hald Madsen

Activity 25. Reflection on openness

To activity 25 I had to create a video, in which I had to reflect on what I learned in h817open, covering one of three elements. I chose 

• What aspect of openness in education interests you most (and why)? 

I wanted to create the video by remixing common licence ressources with my own stuff (photos, screen casts from my former h817open blog posts etc). By purpose I made it a little messy to illustrate the diversity, that powers the networks and learning processes. 
Please have a look below  :)

Tech I used to make the video:

1. Screencast-O-Matic
2. Pixlr.com
3. iMovie
4. FLV Spider Pro
5. Jaksta

Remixed / revised video clips:

1. Wheat Time lapse
2. Bean time lapse
3. Dave Cormier, Embracing uncertainty

Remixed / revised photos:

1. bluebell, by Dominic's pics on Flickr
2. Network, by Dan Zen
3. Road, by Moyan Brenn  
4. Class, by Trondheim Byarkiv
5. Dave Cormier, by cogdogblog
6. Stephen Downes, by Stephen Downes
7. OER, by Martin Weller
8. Smiley, by Glitter Graphics 

Remixed / revised music:

1. Soleil levant, Waxstar on www.jamendo.com

Awarded with Badge 14.05.13

This is not activity 8, but....

As already said this is not a late blog post for activity 8. Instead of collecting OERs for an imaginary course, it is about my planning for next school year. 

Thursday it was decided that I'm going to teach a physics class next year. The upcoming 4th secondary.  I look so much forward to it as I am a physics teacher, but I have only had the subject in the younger classes (as a part of integrated science in 1. - 3. secondary) ever since I moved to Bruxelles 7 years ago.

Our school has a problem with the science in secondary year 4 and 5. Too many students fail. The teachers complain that they do not have the necessary time. The syllabus is long and they only have 2 times 45 minutes a week. They don't have time to explain the concepts over and over again. On top of that there is four obligatory B-tests during the year. Everytime that occupies 2 lessons and the teacher gets a pile of corrections to do. 

I would like to see if I can do parts of this different.  Inspired by all the personal experiences and the knowledge and theories I been through the last 9 months, I have begun to collect OERs to make my own partly online courses for my students. I want to experiment with the flipped classroom. 

Googling around yesterday I found Sophia where I've created a free profile. They offer a platform where I can work with modules of text, images, sound, videoes etc and even make small formative quizzes, to build a tutorial for my students. Yesterday I made two tutorials about forces and work. They are in danish but feel free to have a look: 

• force
• work, force and energy 

Screendump from one of my tutorials on Sophia

I arrange the links for the tutorials in a tabel on my website. In the other colonnes you find the codes for the areas in the syllabus (e.g. M1), the parts of the book connected to the content and the practical work we will do in the class. Below the tabel I try to collect java applets and other simulations and animations to help the students understanding as well. 

Both the website and the Sophia tutorials are projects under construction and it will possibly stay like that for months. I have to make a lot of tutorials to have enough to cover the entire syllabus. If you would like to get an idea about the site, you can have a sneak peek here. The link will leed to the site of mechanics. It''s the one I've worked most on until now.  

Flipping the classroom so the students study the theories at home and then come to class to solve problems and work practical with the peers will put more focus on  what you gain by  knowing and using the theories (I hope).

I've been very fascinated by all the advantages in peer discussions and peer assessment. It will become a more important part of my future physics class.  

All these discussions in the medias about MOOCs and do you actually learn anything when you sit isolated in front of your computer. Here is a danish example from the passed week. The articles picture says it all :)  Recall EDC?

Picture by Katrine Bælum

I find it quite amusing. Because I know how much these online courses have added to me and my practice. Now I'm just exited about the students opinion :)

Feel free to make a comment or leave a good idea.