Cadmium

As you might have noticed lately, I have been struggling with keeping the blog up on a daily basis. As my intensive year-long master's program really starts to get into the swing of things, be prepared to see fewer posts per week. I know...this saddens me too, but time is of the essence.

Speaking of blog writing, I had this weird epiphany today about writing. If there is one thing that I have struggled through high school, college, and even into grad school with is writing. I don't particularly enjoy writing (weird, right? I keep a blog) and I think a lot of my apprehension is that almost all of my writing has been graded or under the scrutiny of a teacher. It's kind of crazy, right? If we think about how many times we write during high school and college, many of us will say that it was only when we had to or when something was assigned. I tried once to keep a journal, but I thought I didn't have anything interesting to write nor did I think I was a good enough writer to be worthy of such daily digests. Sometimes I have these same feelings with my blog.

The reason I write this is not to talk about how much I detest formal writing, but I had a meta-cognitive moment as a future teacher who will definitely assign writing (got to love lab reports!). I think the primary reason I detest writing is because it was always for a grade and never about writing about interests or just writing for the sake of writing. One has to be mindful of sentence structure, grammar, colloquialism, etc., such that it is easy to forget how writing can be an outlet and something enjoyable. I have a professor currently who makes us do these free flowing writing exercises and for some reason I still hate them. HATE THEM. I think it ties back to the judgment factor or that our class writing is always topic specific. Really I want to write about my feelings on the topics, my frustrations, what is on my mind. I think writing allows you to get out of your system what you can't blurt out in the middle of class.

So what is this diatribe for? I've been questioning how to use writing in my future classroom knowing that there are students who share similar experiences with writing. I have tossed around the idea of a class blog lately where students can write about what interests them in the sciences, science in the news, what they are learning, etc. I want my students to know that writing doesn't always have to be graded to produce something that others will enjoy or want to read. And with a blog, my students can go home and show their parents and ultimately be proud of what their class is doing. Let's be real here - who doesn't love a science blog?


Common Occurrences: Cadmium is mostly commonly found in nickel-cadmium batteries, but it is also important in preventing rust on nuts and bolts required for airplane landing equipment (kind of a big deal).

Trivia: The well known impressionist Claude Monet once said "I use white lead, cadmium yellow, vermilion, madder, cobalt blue, and chrome green" for his paint pigments. Can you spot all of the elements in this quote? (Hint: There are more than 4).

Fun Fact: Like lead and mercury (near neighbors to cadmium on the periodic table), cadmium is both toxic and poisonous and accumulates in the environment (read: it is not used and cannot be broken down by organisms). The lesson to be learned from this? Be green and dispose of old batteries properly.