- When you connect kids
to the natural world,
their eyes light up.
I remember my childhood.
Mrs. Black who led these
two-week trips into the wild,
was probably the part of my
education I remember the most.
She always had grad students
who came from the universities,
and they taught us about their work.
And I'll tell you,
that inspired me to unlock
that natural curiosity
that, I think, has stayed
with me for my whole life.
- What really appealed to us
and our broader community,
when we talked about inviting
Sally to be our Ambassador,
was that she's got a
clear love of science,
but also she has a real
love of getting kids outside
and that's really one of
the more important parts
about earth science
education is you need to
have an experience and teach hands-on.
For the work that we do at AGI,
so much of what we do
is we create curricula
for K-12
educators so that they can
go into the classrooms and teach,
which is why we came to Houston,
so we can actually impart
a lot of that curriculum
to the teachers that are present
at our Leadership Academy today.
- And what I saw this morning
was teachers come alive,
like their elementary school kids will,
when they do these hands-on experiments
that relate to geosciences
in the world around them.
- They don't really
care how much you know,
until they know how much you care
and when they start seeing
that you're excited about
what you're talking about or
what you're instilling in them,
they get excited, too.
- I could teach anybody anything,
but to really inspire them
is to move them within their soul.
(thoughtful music)
- I'm learning a lot, not
only from the presenters,
but from the people who are here
sharing their knowledge from
all over the United States.
I'm definitely gaining their insight
on how their students learn,
so then I'm taking that and going to apply it
in my own classroom.
- Most of the jobs that
our children are going
to be getting in the next 20 years
haven't even been created yet
and they've got to know
how to work together
and communicate and
collaborate and be creative
and use their critical thinking skills.
We know that STEM is technology,
we know it's engineering,
but it's really so much more
than that - it's everything.
- Every child is naturally curious.
They want to know, they want to touch,
they want to feel, they want to taste.
What we want to do is
nurture that curiosity,
is keep that mind working.
You want your employees to be curious,
you want them to think for themselves,
you want them to be able to question,
to take you to the next level
and if that's not unlocked in a child,
it's very hard to get back as an adult,
so this is actually really important
for the future of our economy
and the future of our planet.
