The Unicorn Library Weekly News
January 30, 2017
Hidden Figures
They were part of NASA's computer program. Computers at that time were women would calculate math problems by hand. Katherine Johnson worked as a Physicist and Mathematician. She worked on early space missions like Project Mercury and Apollo 11. Dorothy Vaughan was a Mathematician and the first African-American female supervisor at NASA. She taught herself and her team FORTRAN, an early computer coding language. Mary Jackson was a Mathematician who started at NASA as a computer before becoming the first African-American female Aeronautical Engineer. Theses women played pivotal roles in the early years of American space travel.
Here are some lesson plans to incorporate their stories into your classes:
https://www.aip.org/sites/default/files/history/files/LessonPlan_JohnsonDardenandWestComputers.pdf
http://mathforum.org/blogs/max/a-hidden-figures-lesson-plan/
http://blog.mathed.net/2017/01/resources-for-hidden-figures.html
New Books in The Unicorn Library
Chain Reaction
Audacity
The Haters
Unicorn Shout-Out : Jennifer Kendrick
Last year she was contacted by some people who had presented at the same workshop about continuing the project in coordination with the Western History Association and a grant from Notre Dame. Nine teachers were chosen from the Western area to meet at Notre Dame in June of 2016. The task was for three teachers to meet with a scholar and discuss one of the books they had published and collaborate about how that work could be adapted for use in public school classrooms. Jennifer met with Michael Lansing who wrote "Insurgent Democracy: The Nonpartisan League in North American Politics." She took the concepts he thought were most important for kids to learn, put together a unit and created an iBook for students to use as a study guide. She met with the other collaborators at the Annual Conference of the Western History Association in October of 2016 where she presented her work with the author. The same group of teachers are continuing collaboration in a project that creates digital shorts showing historical changes over time.
Great job, Ms. Kendrick!
Remember we are here to help!
The Unicorn Library
Library Assistant: Kim Szekely x6030
Email: jshafer@nbisd.org
Website: www.theunicornlibrary.com
Location: New Braunfels High School, Texas 337 Loop, New Braunfels, TX, United States