Time traveling––An intuitive grasp of time takes time

Abstract

Seeking to understand the experience of time and instruments of its measure, three students of today traveled in past, present and future in analogy to the Time Traveller of nineteenth century novelist H.G. Wells. Like those long before, they watched natural phenomena, wondered at what they saw, and generated observations and instrumental means for recording happenings in time. Sketching shadows one afternoon, they noticed changes and initiated to mark a pillar’s shadow with chalk. On later autumn days, they marked that pillar’s shadow in another color and discussed what these chalk marks revealed about sun, earth and the seasons. A hollow tube exposed the motion of stars; an astrolabe provided a window into the world of ancient observers; the Greek Antikythera mechanism posed an unsolvable puzzle from the past. Other class activities included examining internal mechanisms of kinetic sculptures, wind-up toys and mechanical clocks; reading fictional and historical accounts; and watching stop-action photography in the early silent films of Georges Méliès. Lego constructions by two school-aged boys propelled students’ imagination into the future. I participated with my students through practicing the research pedagogy of Critical Exploration, proposed by Eleanor Duckworth. The teacher of a critical exploration encourages curiosity and personal exploration by careful observation and reaction to student ideas. By not giving them the answers, but inviting open-ended explorations in which anything can happen or be tried, I encouraged my students in collaboratively developing an intuitive sense of time.