How about technology instead of science? There are lots of sorely needed gadgets. For example, a telephone-calling inactivity monitor for diabetics and seniors that calls your friends, not a $25 a month service.

The Wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_power_plant#Radioactive_trace_elements says "The radioactive emission from this coal power plant is 100 times greater than a comparable nuclear power plant with the same electrical output" We should criticize coal plants first, nuclear ones second if we are concerned about radioactive waste.

After we got electric typewriters I could take a class of grade 7 or 8 students and have all of them touch typing faster than they could hunt and peck (or hand write) in about 20 hours. This worked for a few years. Then it stopped working because kids were already very experienced at key whacking their own way when they came to grade one. Many can do 30 words per minute that way, and it takes quite a bit of work to do significantly better touch typing.

I help a few seniors in our town with their computers. They do like to have someone physically present to show them how to do new things. Recommend you find out if your senior has a neighbour who can help and go with the OS he or she is familiar with. Everyone uses Windows in this town. My experience is that seniors have no trouble with malware and a virus checker is probably unnecessary. I don't encourage banking on line. Use solitaire to learn mouse use. Forums like Worldwide Seniors and 50Plus are great if the senior can type at all.

Good advice, Squierstrat! I used the textbook in math, wrote notes on the board in physics and in computer class, I provided my notes as word pro docs on the school network. Printing them out for the kids works well but expect a lot of loss. Talk to other teachers, perhaps in other schools. Experienced teachers may well know less about computer science than you do, but they do know more about kids, classes and where the kids will be going next year. Most teachers love to share their notes and exercises. Relax, you will be amazed at how little material you actually need because the kids need to play with each concept before going on to the text. Teaching to the whole class will only be 10% of class time; mostly you will be helping individuals to accomplish whatever task you have set. Grade school teaching is bottom-up. You begin by getting them to learn specific skills, build on that to do something of somewhat practical use, and perhaps eventually get to put across some abstract points. Kids very often think lessons are pointless. If you can work in something practical, you've got their interest. For example, one of my classes took on the job of creating the program booklet for the local junior hockey team.