I was involved in an interesting conversation a couple of weeks ago after watching a video interview of Jimmy Page, guitarist from Led Zepplin. In the interview he was just 14 years old, and aspired to be not a rock star but a scientist. Then one of our music teachers, Mr. Barrett, shared with me that Brian May of Queen has a Ph.D. in astrophysics! It started me thinking. When we ask children what they want to be when they grow up, often we hear about hopes to be professional athletes, musicians, or movie stars. Why don't they think about careers that involve math or science? Should we care?
I think we should! In an article in the US News and World Report on September 27, 2011, it talks about how jobs of the future revolve around math and science. (http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2011/09/27/why-math-and-science-education-means-more-jobs?PageNr=1) The technology we rely on every day was invented by someone. Our phones, computers, and cars didn't miraculously appear one day, they are the products of the ideas and efforts of people. It led me to think about individuals such as Steve Jobs and the wide impact his ideas have had on our lives. The children in school today will become the inventors, researchers, and scientists of tomorrow. The world in which they will live will likely be vastly different from our reality today. It is our responsibility to prepare them to be able to be collaborative problem-solvers and build within them the capacity to generate new ideas.
So, how do we create interest in careers in math and science? How do we help them to be creative thinkers? I encourage you to help inspire curiousity in our children. When they ask questions, help your children find or discover the answers rather than just giving them. Ask children to make predictions and hypotheses and talk about their reasons for their thinking. Who knows, maybe the next Steve Jobs could be right here at DT!
