Dr. Bob Barkman retired from Springfield College as a distinguished professor where he taught and did research for 44 years. He served as department chair for both the Science and Education departments in separate years. Dr. Bob was the principal investigator for several projects funded by the National Science Foundation, Massachusetts Department of Education, and others. He took leaves of absences to work as a researcher for the National Marine Laboratory in Rhode Island and later as project director for the Technical Education Research Center (TERC) in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Bob’s new book, See the World Through Patterns, is now available. Readers of this book learn from a variety of stories and exercises designed to engage readers with what patterns are, how diverse they are, and what we can discover from them. Because we all are pattern smart in different ways, the book describes how readers can recognize this skill in themselves and learn to see patterns that may have gone unnoticed with the unaided eye.
For 10 years, he led an educational program for young adolescents called Real World Science that was nominated to receive the Governor’s Spirit of Innovation award in education. His most recent book, Science Through Multiple Intelligences; Patterns That Inspire Inquiry, was recognized by the National Science Teachers Association as “only the best.”
For his teaching and leadership, Bob was awarded the Sears Roebuck Foundation Teaching Excellence and Campus Leadership award. Bob is a frequent contributor to Psychology Today. Bob lives with his wife, Dawn, in Longmeadow, MA.