Melbourne, Australia

March 20, 2007

Step 2: Get to Work!

The Project

My project team and I started work at CSIRO officially last Tuesday. We spent our first day touring the facility and meeting the staff. We have an "office" in one of the science labs at the Education Centre with a computer and desk for us to work on. We spent last week doing some more research and finding Australian contacts at specialist schools for us to interview while we are here. We are planning on interviewing as many special education teachers and coordinators as we can during the next two weeks so that we can get the most insight about necessary adaptations for students with disabilities.

The staff at CSIRO has been more than welcoming and they even had an afternoon tea to welcome us with chocolate cake and tea, which was really nice! Spending time with them has proven great for our project as well, because some of them have done programs for specialist schools or students with disabilities.

CSIRO's Education Centre has a "Lab on Legs" program where they bring their science programs to another location; a traveling science education program. Our group went to a secondary school in Melbourne to observe one of the science programs, called Thinking Scientifically. This program provides the students with a question and the equipment necessary to find the answer, but does not provide any concrete instructions. The goal of this program is to get the students to truly use the scientific method to solve problems and make sure that their variables are consistent in everything that they do. It was an interesting program to watch; watching Year Sevens try to figure everything out was very interesting. While we observed the programs, we took special notice of which aspects of the program would be difficult for students with various disabilities.

Today (Monday), I spent the day at the CSIRO Education Centre observing the programs, Gene Technology and Forensics Frenzy for 2 groups of Year 10s. These programs proved to be great programs, but still pose a fair amount of barriers for students with certain disabilities, which we will address throughout the rest of the project. CSIRO Education Centre really does put on a broad range of really great hands-on science programs and I have been continually impressed while watching them.

We are spending the next few days,contacting specialist schools and scheduling interview times with them. We have several interviews already planned (my group members went to a deaf facility for one today) to gain as much advice and insight from local Victorian teachers and other administrators before the end of term (Easter Break).

All in all, the project is going really well, but we still have a lot of work to do! My project partners and I are working very hard, but are still having a great time while we are here! Our sponsor, Chris, is awesome and has been a great addition to our time in Melbourne so far!

Sight Seeing

This was a great week in Melbourne!! The weather was gorgeous and our group did a lot together in the city! Throughout the week, we all go to work and usually come home from work pretty tired, but after work, we find little things to do in the city. One night, our whole group went out for gelato together, which was a blast! Australia has a lot of great places to eat and their gelato is fantastic! There are also plenty of cafés around the area to go to as well.

This past weekend was fantastic! A few of the girls in the group and I went to one of the big parks in the city (there are so many beautiful parks in the city...they are scattered all over, so it's really easy to find a quiet, comfortable place to sit and read a book or just relax). The girls and I brought a picnic and just hung out and relaxed in the park and enjoyed our fresh fruits from the local market. The weather was perfect, so we all soaked up the sun and had a great time!

People in Australia are so friendly and get so excited when they hear that we are Americans!! It's really funny because they have so many questions and they love talking with us, which is a lot of fun! There are a lot of college aged people in the city, because there are several universities (referred to as "Uni"), which makes it fairly easy for us to meet people our age when we are out and about.

Also, Federation Square is a big place for people to go and there are different things going on there most of the time. Saturday night, there was a concert there for the Opening Ceremonies of FINA (Swimming World Championships) and there was a Thai Festival there on Sunday. Melbourne has a lot of culture and they definitely embrace it, which is awesome! It has been really great for all of us and we've learned a lot!

A bunch of the guys in the group went to the Australian Grand Prix, which is Formula 1 Racing. I don't have to tell you that they were all beyond excited to go and had a great time and came back drooling at how incredible the cars were. :-)

I, on the other hand, spent my Sunday at St. Kilda Beach, which is one of the bigger beach areas in the Melbourne and it is awesome!! Lucky for us, the Swimming World Championships (FINA) is in Melbourne for the next two weeks. The first event was the 5K Open Water Swim, so we watched the men swim laps in the ocean and we were right up front for the award's ceremony, too! I was pumped to be standing with some of the world's best swimmers! I have tickets to go watch diving and swimming later this week, too!

Basically...Melbourne is one of the greatest places in the entire world!! :-)

Things I've Learned So Far

1. Always look right, left, right before you cross the street!
2. Biscuit = cookie
3. If you want the front seat of the car, you call "Bags" (instead of "Shotgun").
4. "Off ya tree" = crazy
5. Jumper = Zip-Up Sweater
6. They don't have any pennies, so they round up or down to the nearest 5 cents when you buy things.
7. Tax is always included, so what you see for a price initially is what you pay.
8. There are no paper $1 bills, but they do have $1 and $2 coins, which means when you throw change in the bottom of your purse and go to get it a week later, you usually have about $15. 8. :-)
9. Americans are cleverly referred to as "Yanks."
10. Wingee = Whiner
11. Muletas Café on Franklin Street really does have the best pancakes in Melbourne!