Diane and I went to a truly wonderful talk this evening given by the actor Alan Alda.. Everyone knows him from his MASH days,. what you may not appreciate is what a fantastic spokesman he is for the Sciences.. Actually.. he’s not just  a spokesman for the science .. but he’s a champion of getting the scientists to be better  spokespeople for their own work..

 

He spoke for an hour without notes or slides.He was entertaining, interesting.. and so deeply man. I can’t remember ever enjoying a talk this much.  He was speaking  for the 95% of folks he claims are not science literate.. He compared most of their interaction with science as a bad blind date.. and he intends to make that first date less awkward. In face, He likened learning science to love.. first comes attraction, then infatuation.. and finally commitment.. it really resonated with my own experience to sharing science with kids.. you have to real them in.. keep them interested.. then it sticks.

Along the way I picked up some great nuggets about communicating.. science or anything else I think.. Alda’s main message was about the importance of relating to your audience.. and having enough empathy to understand what they want .. how they learn.. and how they take in information. He talked about the importance of listening, the need for improv skills.. (I still remember an Improv class I took from Paul Zaloom as being one of the best things I ever did to help my show)

T
I first learned about Alda’s love of science when i heard a Science Friday podcast about ‘The Flame Challenge’. The idea came to alda based on an experience when he was 11. He asked a teacher .. “what is flame” and got a non inspiring answer.. Now nearly 70 years later.. he’s circling back to fix that,. The Flame challenge.. which is (i think) in it’s 4th year, challenges sceintists to explain to an 11 year old some scientific principle like “what is a flame?”, or “what is color ?”.. or last years “what is time ?”.. or this years “what is sleep ?”.. You still have 2 weeks to apply for this years !

The results are judged by kids themselves.. last year Alda said it was 20,000 11 year olds.. how’s that for a jury..

Here’s the winning entry from the first years “What is Flame ?” questions

What is a Flame from Benjamin J. Ames on Vimeo.

here were many lessons I plan to apply to my own science schtick.. i was so grateful to UVM and the Alda center at Stoney Brook for making this happen tonight. (Thanks Dan H !!!)

nite all, nite sam
-me