It gets worse...


More "science" from the NJ Core Curriculum Content Standards:

5.3B: Matter and energy transformation: Food is required for energy and building cellular materials. Organisms in an ecosystem have different ways of obtaining food, and some organisms obtain their food directly from other organisms. [So far so, good...]
By the end of Grade 4

Content:

Almost all energy (food) and matter can be traced to the Sun.
No, it can't.

The sun is hydrogen busy fusing into helium. Maybe the committee meant "Almost all food (energy and matter) can be traced to the sun." Still not quite correct, but not blatantly wrong.

The sun is not massive enough to go supernova. It's not going to meld protons into carbon or oxygen or any number of other elements essential to life. It will make lots of helium, which is good for birthday parties, funny voices, and the Large Hadron Collider, but it's unlikely we'll ever get it, unless Earth getting eaten up by a red giant counts.

We are made of elements produced by unimaginably energetic events, exploding stars much more massive than our local sun.

Anybody in Trenton paying attention?





The photo shows the remnants of a supernova, a composite photo made using a 48" telescope,
found here at NASA's "Astronomy Photo of the Day"

Michael Heinz and Lisa Solmose have worked hard to improve things here in New Jersey.
I've met them both, and they both are bright and personable, faced with a daunting task.

Blog Archive