Introduction to Whelmers

A long, long time ago, in a school far, far away, I was a classroom teacher. Before writing science activities for television and working at the Mr. Wizard studio, I experienced the joys and demanding life of teaching. Early in my teaching career, my school principal gave me a challenge. He wanted me to teach a class of students who had failed previous attempts to pass a basic science class. I was wary of leaving the relative calm of teaching Physics and Advanced Placement Chemistry. However, the principal found a crack in my defense. I have a soft heart. I accepted his challenge.

When I arrived at school in the fall, I learned that the class had grown into two classes. I had eighty students. To my delight, the principal had arranged extra salary for the additional class. My enthusiasm for teaching those students soon waned. In no uncertain terms, they informed me that they did not want to be there. They did not like school. They did not like me. They did not like science, unless we could blow something up. And, they were prepared to suffer through another year attempting to earn the required science credit.

I soon learned that the kids were bright and intelligent, but the natural curiosity they surely had as young children, was gone. I could not engage them in any meaningful learning activities. It was clear to me that I was competing with severe complacency; the result of a lifestyle that include many family, emotional, and cultural problems. Also, the students seemed to be so hurried and impatient; the antithesis of a good science student. They suffered from Hurry Sickness.

I tried everything to get my students involved. I found myself slipping into the pattern of performing whiz-bang demonstrations; pop, bang, fizz. There was not much depth to them and they had limited educational value. But, at least, the students kept quiet and gave the appearance of learning something. I was doing a poor job, and I knew it.

One of my experienced colleagues suggested to me that I should not expend my efforts trying to overwhelm my students all the time. It gave them the wrong impression of science. That was true, but these kids were not self starters as were those in my chemistry and physics classes. How could I get them engaged? Perhaps, instead of overwhelming them, I should just try to "whelm" them a little. It worked. Thus was the birth of "Whelmers."

For the next twenty years, I collected activities and demonstrations that whelm students. Activities that spark their curiosity. Activities that will catch, for a moment at least, the eye and mind of even the most indifferent student.

I found that the whelming process opens the door to involvement in other science curricula. It also gives the teacher an excellent opportunity to model and engage students in many science process skills, as well as present them with a great deal of science content.

At a recent Whelmer workshop in Aurora, Colorado, one of the participants coined the phrase: "Hook, Line, and Thinker." The term hook refers to the engaging phenomena characteristic of a whelmer. Line, refers to the best part of the whelmer: the science process skills that are used and modeled in the activity. I suggest using the Hook, Line, and Thinker method for presenting whelmers; including each of the three components in each activity.

Whelmers are a tool to be used by a classroom teacher to engage students; to draw their attention from the incredibly busy and hurried lifestyle we all experience. Whelmers should not be a substitute for a comprehensive science program, but an integral part of one.

By the way, all 80 students passed that year.

Steven Jacobs