Reflections on Three “Might-Have-Been” Mentors

Note: I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the role of mentors in one’s educational development and remembered the following essay I wrote for the Virtual Conference in Informal Science Education, sponsored by the Society for Amateur Scientists in … Continue reading

The Palace of Delights: A Reunion

A view from the balcony of the Exploratorium on Pi Day. Photo by the author. Last Saturday we accompanied some friends of ours on a trip to the Exploratorium in San Francisco.  Many, many years ago the science show Nova … Continue reading

The Science Project is Blowin’ in the Wind

Elsewhere I have written about the power of projects.  There is no educational experience that quite matches making an example of what you are studying, or even a model of it.  But the experience of building or making something goes … Continue reading

Learning to Wrangle Electrons

In other venues, I’ve lamented the fact that learning how to play with electronics has been one of my intellectual white whales.  There are many, many books and web sites out there that exist to help people like me, but … Continue reading