In my own words · Washington County, FL

Why I love microscopes

A Keyence optical microscope set up on a laboratory bench with its monitor and sample stage. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Microscopes" page — read by families in Washington County, FL. — A Keyence optical microscope set up on a laboratory bench with its monitor and sample stage. Renee Pillers, USGS · Public domain

There is a whole world I could not see before.
Pond water is not empty.
My own skin looks like a map.

You can love microscopes in Washington County.

What it really is

A microscope makes small things big enough for your eye to resolve.

Three things to try today

Look at a leaf, then the same leaf up close.
Look at a drop of pond water.
Draw exactly what you see, not what you expected.

Project scientist Anna Maria Ruby leans over a microscope to view samples in the Microgravity Simulation Support Facility at Kennedy Space Center. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Microscopes" page — read by families in Washington County, FL. — Project scientist Anna Maria Ruby leans over a microscope to view samples in the Microgravity Simulation Support Facility at Kennedy Space Center. NASA · Public domain

For the grown-up reading this

A child in Washington County, FL who loves microscopes is not unusual. A child in Washington County, FL who is told that loving microscopes is unusual — that is the problem. Washington County is one of 67 counties in Florida.

Draw what you see, not what you know. That discipline is the whole of observational science.

If the kid who loves this is a girl

Read what one popular teacher said to one little girl who took out the classroom trash without being asked — and what that girl did with the rest of her life.

Girls are great at math — Washington County, FL →