Part Ten of My So Called Blog

So my science lesson flopped and here’s why: daisies are not a viable substitute for carnations. My science lesson was supposed to go as follows: students will have one control (white flower in a cup of clear water) and one variable (white flower in a cup of water tinted with food coloring). Within a day, students will see the variable flower’s petals turn the color of the water thus resulting in a wildly fruitful discussion on plant parts. Unfortunately, this only works if the student scientists use carnations, NOT daisies. So when I came into school on day two of the experiment and saw both the control and the variable flowers still beaming white in color, I had to make a difficult decision. Do I own up to my mistake and still try and teach the lesson or do I paint the flower and fake the science? After an internal ethics argument, I rationalized that I am still a teacher in training and therefore am not equipped to salvage a failed lesson, so I opted to paint the flowers. Another thing about daisies is that they do not take to slathering food coloring across the petals. So I tried to marinate the flowers upside down in the colored water, hopefully dying the flowers the color of the water. That attempt also failed. It appears that daisies are extremely color resistant! Minutes before the lesson, I tried one last attempt at coloring the petals with food coloring and what ensued was just a mess of food coloring. Thankfully the petals were kind enough to provide the surface that the food coloring droplets balanced on, enough to appear to be spotted with color. One student scientist almost called my bluff when he questioned my multicolored finger tips. I used it as an excuse to remind the student scientists to keep from touching the flowers!

Lesson learned: do not substitute science materials unless you are a schooled botanist.