The Beauty of Science

The end of our school year is trudging ever so slowly in our direction. As I review what I have taught my children this year and what I had hoped to teach them before putting the books up for the summer, I grumble inwardly over the issue of Science.

We started our study of Physics this spring, having devoted the fall to the study of Modern History. Physics went well enough for a time. We read about Galileo and Newton, gravity, motion, simple machines, etc.  We copied equations and laws.  We began a biography of Albert Einstein and read a few chapters of John Hudson Tiner's Exploring the World of Physics.  We had a blast with our Physics Workshop, and spent half a morning testing the best design and trajectory for paper airplanes. The boys attended Robotics Club and constructed countless Lego spaceships.  And that's just what I remember off the top of my head.

Now that I've typed it all out, it feels like a lot.  But when I think of what I would like my children to carry into adulthood, I realize how much more I wish had taught them this year and wonder how much I can cram into our last weary days of fourth and second grades.

And then I remember: they are in fourth and second grades. It's okay if they don't fully understand Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity and his General Theory of Relativity, let alone the difference between the two.  They'll get it eventually, and if they don't, well...  They might still be okay.

(Quick!  Explain Einstein's theories to me... See, they'll be alright.  Maybe you dig Einstein, but I can't remember, prior to reading Albert's bio, the last time I thought about relativity, let alone had to explain it to anyone).

I also remember that we have visited the zoo, worked in the garden, watched a newly transformed butterfly struggle to take flight, and held wiggling earthworms in our hands before depositing them in our homemade worm habitat. They have studied snakes and wild cats and alligators and crickets, all of their own volition. We even learned a little about human anatomy during a field trip to the ER, a lesson I hope never to repeat in such a hands-on fashion.

I had planned to delve deeply into Physics this year.  While we failed to excavate all of that subject's hidden secrets, we did uncover a few gems, and we caught glimpses of treasures yet to be unearthed. I hope that when Physics comes around in another four years, my children will welcome it as a familiar digging ground, even if they never write a paper on the photoelectric effect.

In the meantime, as we finish our biography of one of history's greatest physicists and in the years to come, we will revel in the broader field of Science - Zoology, Botany, Anatomy, Astronomy, Chemistry, and yes, Physics - spreading marvelously in every direction. This, I believe, is the beauty of science.  We learn it every day in a tangled glory of unplanned moments.

I don't mean this post to be a "Hey, look what we did!" sort of post. If you took it as such, I apologize.  If, on the other hand, you completely understand what it means to feel a slight tremor of fear creep upon you as you reflect on a year's labors...

Relax. You've done a lot more than you realize.