Five million years ago, a bobcat-esque mammal named Panthera blythae lived and died atop the freezing Himalayas. Its remains drifted down to settle into a delta where its softball-sized skull was extremely well-preserved. Circa 2006, it was unearthed by a team of evolutionary biologists, carefully extracted within a cast, and…

I love a good story. Especially a good science fiction or fantasy one. I think a storyteller’s greatest gift is not creating something new, but rather shining a new light on something familiar and instinctual. Especially in sci-fi/fantasy, when storytellers ask us to accept so many new ‘truths’: magic, time…

I told this ten-minute story at Canal Convergence, an annual art walk in my city — Scottsdale, Arizona. Light Is Cool And We Suck At Seeing It Light is one sliver of the spectrum of electromagnetic waves. We can only see a select range of this spectrum. …

Whether it’s a cactus, a live animal, a scalpel, or a power drill, here’s why I know that kids can handle it. I’m a science educator, consultant, and storyteller and this is my Ignite Phoenix 19 talk. Twenty 1st-3rd graders are strapping on safety goggles and rolling up the sleeves…

Cloud in a Bottle = Bottled Confidence I have a tendency to expect more of kids than most other educators I’ve met. I believe that if you ask children to perform just beyond the boundaries of their ability, they will concentrate harder, display better teamwork, and ultimately perform better. Think…

Standing in a gallery called “ORIGINS” in a natural history museum, I am overwhelmed with the amount of things I could teach from this content. Geologic time. Plate tectonics. Reading timelines. Evolution. Origins of humans. But, what are the benefits of breaking down the fourth wall and teaching, instead, about…

‘Mother and daughter’ is a loaded label. Tough to unpack, a minefield of independence and nurturing, broad generational gaps shoved unceremoniously together, long-practiced side-eyes and tongue-clucking, and the constantly overflowing love that mothers are made of. My widowed grandma moved across the country and into my parents’ extra bedroom almost…

Here are four things I did to write, memorize, and tell a six-minute story in front of a live audience. There is also a pie chart and I made some math equations, for your enjoyment.* *The pie chart and math equations are dedicated to Daniel A. and Julie C. Lots…

The theme of my first live story slam was ‘Service’. That can mean different things to different people. There is the kind given to your country or to your religion. There is service in exchange for something else. A mutual agreement. There is public service. For me, service is living…