Ivy and Bean: What's the Big Idea? (4 page)

“And it's all our fault!” said Bean. That was the worst part.

Ms. Aruba-Tate was quiet for a moment. She looked like she was thinking hard. Then she said, “Boys and girls, I'm hearing that you are very worried about global warming. I'm feeling sorry that you're worried, but I'm also feeling glad that you care so much about the earth. People who care as much as you do are the people who will find solutions to the problem.”

The second graders looked at each other. Solutions? There were solutions? “Right now, scientists all over the world are trying to find ways to stop global warming. Science is the solution, not the problem.
That's why I'm sad when I hear you say you hate science.”

“They should work harder,” said Drew.

Ms. Aruba-Tate looked at him. “Do you remember, Drew, when we talked about cave dwellers? Some of you thought cave dwellers were stupid, because they didn't know how to build houses, and we talked about how people have to experiment in order to make their lives better. Remember?”

“Yeah,” said Emma. “We decided maybe cave men got the idea for houses from watching termites.”

“Exactly!” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. “We get ideas, we experiment, and we find solutions to our problems. That's what scientists do.”

“But they haven't found the solution to global warming,” said Ivy.

“They haven't found one perfect solution, but they've found lots of little ones, like cars that don't pollute so much. Each little solution is a step toward a big solution,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. “Do you think the first house built by a cave man was perfect? No, it probably collapsed—”

“It caved in!” yelled Dusit. Eric and Drew fell over laughing.

“Thank you, Dusit,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. “And the second house probably caved in, too. But each time, the cave dwellers learned something new, and in the end, they built a house that stayed up. They were cave scientists. Scientists don't give up if something doesn't work perfectly; they look for new ideas to make it better.” She smiled. “And that reminds me of you. You children have new ideas all the time, which means you're already good scientists. Each one of you could come up with an idea to fight global warming.”

“But we're kids,” said Vanessa.

“You're kid scientists,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate firmly. “What we need for this problem is new ideas. And you kids are great at that.”

“Yeah,” whispered Bean. She
was
great at new ideas. She had them all the time.

“So—I think we have our theme for the Emerson School Science Fair, don't you?” asked Ms. Aruba-Tate. “Ideas that fight global warming.”

Oh, this is going to be great, thought Bean. If she stopped global warming, she'd be the most famous person in the world. “Do you win anything if your idea is the best?” she called out.

Ms. Aruba-Tate smiled. “You sure do. You win a special certificate of Scientific Achievement from the Principal!”

Sheesh. Bean had been hoping for money. But she would fight global warming anyway.

“This would be a lot easier if we had some of those white coats,” Bean said. She speared her bagel on her thumb and took a chomp out of it.

“Lab coats,” said Ivy, licking her cream cheese. “And lots of little bottles of chemicals.”

“What if there was just this one chemical that would stop global warming and we discovered it?” Bean said dreamily. She imagined herself holding up a test tube full of shimmering pink stuff. TA-DA, she was saying. All around her, other scientists clapped in amazement.

“Don't you remember?” Ivy interrupted her dream. “My mom said she was never going to get me another chemistry set after what happened last time.”

“You have some potion ingredients, don't you?” asked Bean. Ivy was going to be a witch
when she grew up, so there were usually potion ingredients in her room.

“I've got some dead flies and some baking soda,” said Ivy. “And some brick powder.”

Bean sighed. “I don't think any of those is going to cure global warming.”

“Me neither,” said Ivy. “But what will?”

“We have to
think
,” said Bean.

Ivy thought and sucked cream cheese out of her hair.

Bean thought and squeezed her head between her hands until her eyeballs almost popped out. “There's recycling, I guess,” she said. “We could show how it's good for the earth.”

“But everyone already knows about recycling,” said Ivy. “We're supposed to have a
new
idea.”

They thought some more.

Bean's dad came into the kitchen. He looked at their thinking faces and sat down at the table next to Bean. “What's happening, kidalunks?”

“We need an idea to stop global warming,” said Bean.

“Easy,” he said. “Get rid of cars.”

“Dad, we're seven. We don't have cars. We need something we can do for a science fair.”

“Oh,” said her dad. He leaned against the back of his chair and frowned. For several moments it was quiet.

Suddenly, he snapped his fingers. “Okay! Got one! You guys can make posters that remind people to turn out the lights! You know, to save electricity. You could have a slogan, like ‘Lights Out When You're Out!'” He smiled at them proudly. “Isn't that good?”

Bean and Ivy exchanged looks. “Yeah, Dad,” said Bean. “Great. Thanks.”

“Well!” he said. “I'm going to go clean out the drains.”

“Okay,” said Bean. Ivy and Bean watched as he left the room. Then they looked at each other and shook their heads. “That has got to be the most boring idea ever,” said Bean.

“You know grown-ups,” said Ivy. “They don't have very good imaginations.”

Ivy and Bean began thinking again.

“What if . . .” began Ivy and stopped. She stared at the refrigerator. “Ice cubes!”

Bean looked at the refrigerator, too. “What about them?”

“Think—how do you cool down a hot thing?” asked Ivy, “Ice cubes! If we could put ice cubes up in the sky, the air would get colder, right?”

“Right,” said Bean. “But how are we going to put ice cubes in the sky?” asked Ivy.