Thursday, August 26, 2010

Alton Brown, Chemistry, and High School

My oldest is starting high school this year. This brings scary words to the table like "credits" and "geometry", "Chemistry" and "Research". Shudder....

It is a little bit scary, but for the most part, all it really means is that I need to categorise what he is doing a bit better on paper. For my boy, his freshman year is going to be the year of Chemistry.

Enter, Alton Brown. My mom suggested Alton Brown for Alex early this summer, and sent him a book of his for his birthday. And as I was looking through it, I realised that there is a lot of information in his shows. Like A LOT! He's like the Bill Nye of cooking but for the older crowd. And I was thinking, why not build a curriculum around food and Chemistry? Alex already LOVES food (apple/tree) and building on things they love is the best way to get them invested in anything... so I have started writing up a curriculum that covers the basics of Chemistry using the books, videos, and activities of Alton Brown. It has been a project, but not a difficult one. Just having the activities and videos tie together has been the hardest. Mostly, it has been fun!

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3 comments:

Beth said...

Oh! I'd love to see your finished product. We love watching Alton Brown because of all the science and facts. My son also loves to cook and now that he's 12, we're heading into more complicated stuff. I also think this is such a great idea for a science course. Have fun with it!

Committed Recycler said...

I've been a fan of Alton Brown for years. Thanks for the link! Now that my littlest ones are getting older this might go on the list of shows that we can watch together, and I will keep him in mind when setting up at home projects for us.

Dawn said...

High school? Are you serious? I had no idea -- it comes so fast.