BrainPop: Science
Brainpop describes itself as the leading producer of educational animated movies. Their Web site has a science page that currently contains sixty-five animated movies, with a large portion of them being physical science related. Each subject contains a 3-4 minute Movie, an Interactive Quiz, an Experiment, a Comic Strip, a How-to hands-on application, a Timeline, and a printable Activity Page. Visitors can play three movies per day for free (all of which begin by a somewhat annoying ad for subscr
Toothbrush Beats out PC, Car, Cell Phone as the Invention Most Americans Say They Cannot Live Withou
The Lemelson-MIT Invention Index is "an annual survey of Americans' perceptions about inventing and innovating," and on January 21, 2003, the results for 2003 were released. According to this article, the one invention that respondents said they could not live without was the toothbrush, which was found to be more important than the PC, the automobile, the cellular phone, and the microwave oven. Specific results are reported in the press release. Also on this Web site are links to the previous s
Nutrition Cafe
Developed jointly by the Pacific Science Center and the Washington State Dairy Council, Nutrition Cafe offers students three interactive games to explore the world of nutrition. The first game, Nutrient Sleuth, is an entertaining hangman-style game where students try to discover what nutrients different characters are missing based on clues and letter guesses. Another enjoyable offering is Grab A Grape, a Jeopardy-style game where site visitors try to match nutrition-related questions with answe
Science Sampler : Six rules for integrating the arts
How can teachers help their students to imagine and construct knowledge in the way that science sees it and simultaneously weave the arts into science lessons? By using the following six simple rules for integrating the arts into science learning, students' imagined worlds come closer to the way science sees them using an inquiry-based format.
Manipula math with Java : Hyppocrates' lunar
This applet leads students through a proof of how the area of two lunar sections is equal to the area of a triangle inscribed in a semicircle. The illustration uses color-coded sections and gives students hints to help find the theorem. The proof uses the Pythagorean theorem to establish the relationship between the lunar sections and the triangle. A separate sequence of diagrams shows the outline of the proof to simplify it. Copyright 2005 Ohio State University
Learning math : Measurement
This college level course, developed for elementary and middle school teachers, begins with the fundamentals of measurement, then examines standard units in the metric and customary systems. Online workshop sessions cover measurement of a circle, area and volume formulas, angle measurement, and indirect measurement encountered in trigonometry. The final session explores ways to apply these concepts to K-8 classroom teaching. Each of its ten sessions contains video programming, problem-solving ac
Science Sampler: Multiple Intelligences and Lab Groups
Science teachers who are committed to excellence in the classroom continually seek ways to improve teaching and learning, and the concept of multiple intelligences holds promise as a method for accomplishing this. Acknowledging these intelligences offers teachers an interesting opportunity to appeal to the different personalities and learning styles that are present in the classroom. In this research project, the theory of multiple intelligences was integrated into a seventh grade science curric
An Earth Science Scrapbook Project as an Alternative Assessment Tool
Scrapbooking is a popular hobby and as such, has found its way into educational settings, primarily in middle and elementary school levels. This article describes a scrapbook project that is used both as a means of demonstrating the connections between geology and students daily lives and as an alternative form of assessment. The project was developed for an introductory Earth Science class for middle school and high school pre-service teachers.
1900 Air Pollution
Examine this graph from FRONTLINE/NOVA: Whats Up with the Weather? Web site to see dramatic increases in three greenhouse gases over the last two hundred years.
Compare and contrast warm and cold fronts
This pair of Earth science animations show students what happens at cold and warm fronts as clouds are formed by the interaction of warm air and cool air. The cool front animation depicts cumulonimbus clouds forming as a cold front moves into a region of warm air and forces the warm air to rise. In contrast, the warm front animation shows how warm air, moving over cold air, causes a progression of nimbostratus to cirrus clouds to form. Movie controls allow students to repeat, pause, or step thro
Mathematics Museum
Like any museum, this website called the Mathematics Museum provides some interesting visuals and explanations of various aspects of its subject, in this case mathematics. For example, the Fractal 3D Gallery includes video footage of 3D fractals and an FAQ section that provides some basic information on fractals. The Kodawari house includes some interesting math games and instruction for children as well as more advanced mathematics. Visitors can browse images created using Mathematica software
The Need for Ocean Literacy in the Classroom - Part I : An overview of efforts to promote ocean lite
Society is largely ocean illiterate and a basic understanding of the key concepts needed for sound decision making on matters related to sustainability and the health of humankind is lacking. At present, a network of approximately 100 members of the ocean science and education communities are working together to make understanding the ocean part of the formal K-12 curriculum. The emergent consensus among the members of the group has resulted in a definition of ocean literacy that is supported by
Ten preparation steps for a successful group presentation
This resource informational piece, part of a series about the future of energy, introduces students to the process of making a successful group presentation. It lists 10 steps for students to follow when making presentations. These include: research and gather information, focus the group's efforts, create a story line, and self-evaluate, among others. Students are given guided questions and checklists for each of the 10 steps to self-evaluate whether they have successfully completed the step. A
Observe images of advection fog
This Earth science resource presents six photographs depicting examples of advection fog along various coastal areas in the United States. The introduction explains how advection fogs form and provides a brief explanation of how they differ from radiation fogs. Students are instructed to click on each labeled image to see an enlarged version of it. Each enlarged version includes a caption that describes the location of the fog relative to local landmarks in the picture. Copyright 2005 Eisenhower
Quick take on area and volume
This one-page document highlights online resources with virtual manipulatives that can help make area and volume real for students. Be sure to check out the sites these resources are from; the sites contain many other interesting and useful mathematics learning resources.
Expedition to the Poles
In this lesson students will pretend they have just returned from a year in the Arctic or Antarctic. They will look at Web sites about these regions and expeditions to them, and they will create posters illustrating their experiences. Students will conclude by writing paragraphs explaining what it would be like to visit the polar region that they did not focus on in this lesson. As they complete this activity students will research the characteristics of the polar regions and the things they wou
Astronomy
This page contains links to one pagers on historical instruments of astronomy with photos of the following : Astronomy Slides, Celestial Globe, Cometarium, Globe, Gregorian Telescope, Kepler's Laws Demonstration, Orrery, Planetarium, Planisphere, Stereoscopic Pictures of the Moon, Tellurian, and Transit.
Conan the Bacterium
This on-line news article reveals the defense strategy of radiation-resistant Deinococcus radiodurans to be a tightly packed ring of DNA. The article explores the hypothesis of some that indicates the microbe originated on Mars and describes the actions of others that used experiments to show resistance is not attributed to repair enzymes, as was once believed. The article details the implications of these findings and concludes with future studies regarding the organism.
Keeping Cool at Deep-Sea Vents
This Astrobiology Magazine article reports that a research team of marine scientists has determined that water chemistry controls the location and distribution of two species of weird worms inhabiting deep-sea hydrothermal vent sites: the tubeworm (Riftia pachyptila) and Pompeii worm (Alvinella pompejana). The article includes color images of the worms and monitoring equipment, links to related web pages and other astrobiology resources, and an MP3 machine text-to-speech function.
Wisconsin Fast Plants Program
This is the homepage of the Fast Plants organization. Fast Plants are inexpensive seeds which take approximately 2 weeks from planting to flowering. The website includes seed ordering, growing directions, and activities.
