Survival of the Fittest Microbes: Examining the Conditions of One River and the Microbes that Thrive
In this lesson, created for grades 6 - 12, students learn about the harsh conditions of Spain's Rio Tinto River and research the microbes that nonetheless manage to thrive there. They then synthesize their knowledge by creating a reality television program set in the Rio Tinto in which the microbes are the "contestants." The lesson includes an article about the Rio Tinto with accompanying questions, a detailed classroom activity, vocabulary list, discussion questions, extension activities, inter
Biology Textbook (CA Textbook)
Students explore the science of biology in an interactive and engaging way. This online resource provides a powerful framework for connecting the big ideas of biology to the California standards.
This digital textbook was reviewed for its alignment with California content standards.
Visual Datasets
The Visual Datasets text module discusses the concept of visual learning and presents some suggestions for ways to design learning environments that support students in developing visual literacy skills. Three visual datasets that can be used for problem solving activities in evolution, classification, development, and botany are included:
Caminacules: A dataset of imaginary animals that can be used as the basis for a variety of problem-posing and problem-solving activities in evolution, classi
Phylogenetic Investigator
Phylogenetic Investigator (PI) is a software package designed to facilitate creative problem-solving in phylogenetic analysis for the purpose of teaching and learning phylogenetic inference. Users can identify characters and states, polarize characters, and engage in directed-search phylogenetic tree construction.
PI also allows the user to
* make inferences and represent them one step at a time
* vary representational features of their trees (such as angle of divergence and time betwee
CuraÁao
CuraÁao is a computer program that simulates the sterile insect release method (SIRM) of pest population suppression, first conceived by E. F. Knipling (1955).
The user can investigate the effects of several variables on the effectiveness of the method and discover what happens when some of the basic assumptions of the model are relaxed or violated in some way. The user should gain some understanding of the sorts of things that complicate the application of the technique in situations that are
Foto: Modernity in Central Europe, 1918-1945
During and directly after World War I, four great empires (Germany, Austro-Hungary, Russia, and the Ottomans) crumbled precipitously, to be replaced by more than one dozen fledgling nation-states. The largely agrarian, in some cases semifeudal, societies of central Europe were thrust nearly overnight into crises of civil war, unemployment, or inflation — and beyond these crises into a world propelled by mass media and consumer economies. Becoming modern was attractive but also anxiety-provokin
An Integrated 3D Geodatabase for Palladio's Work
The paper presents a novel digital 3D GIS web-based system entirely founded on Google Earth, built to offer a deep insight into Palladio's opera for restitution of its architectural surveys, reconstruction for historical reasons, analysis for structural and other options, and assembly and presentation of all certified Palladian documentation.The development of the application follows the philosophy of visual computing and it is based on an architectural knowledge representation.The information s
Bering Sea Climate
The Bering Sea Climate website contains time series data that measures climate and ecosystem status in the Bering Sea. The site presents data, metadata, and graphics by allowing the user to select categories and then click a button for the desired function. Data can be displayed as a list, a time series plot, or in terms of recent trends, relevance, and correlation. Measured parameters include weather, oceanographic and climate data, sea ice data, and fisheries and other biological data. The sit
Update on course content: EPrints -> WordPress -> FeedBurner -> iTunes
Much of the Introductory Chemistry course content has now been deposited in our repository, with the course website using slideshare, YouTube and the repository as storage for the OERs. Content was ‘uploaded’ to slideshare directly from the repository, using slideshare’s ‘web upload’ deposit feature. The radio programmes have been published to iTunes and a local [...]
Experimental and analytical seismic evaluation of concrete masonry-infilled steel frames retrofitted
The study conducted herein focuses on investigating the retrofitting effect of face shell mortar bedding (FSMB) hollow concrete masonry-infilled steel frames (CMISF) subjected to in-plane lateral loads using glass fiber reinforced plastic (GFRP) laminates that are epoxy-bonded to the exterior faces of the infill walls. The study involves three main phases, the first phase studies the in-plane behavior of unreinforced masonry (URM) wall subassemblages strengthened with different GFRP composite la
Product Differentiation, Celebrity Endorsements and the Consumers Perception of Quality
In any market-driven Capitalistic economy it is the consumer that accounts for the vast majority of the output. Economists and Marketing scholars have long studied what motivates the consumer to demand, and eventually purchase, specific products.Depending on the type of product, the rational consumer will seek information about the quality and performance prior to purchase. Much of this information comes from advertising.Often times, seemingly similar products sell for different prices meaning t
The Great Depression, the New Deal, and Rural North Carolinians: Analyzing Photographs
In this lesson, students will study photographs of tobacco bag stringers in rural North Carolina, taken to illustrate the report the Virginia-Carolina Service Corporation prepared for Congress in 1939. Students will critically analyze the photographs, making observations about the content of the images, their reactions to them, and what they tell us about the Great Depression. These observations will be structured into a "Know/Want to Know/Learned" chart, in which students will record their prio
Object of History
The Object of History is a cooperative project between the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media. The project was conceived of in an effort to find a low cost way for students and teacher of U.S. History to have access to the museum’s collections and the expertise of the curators. As a result the materials on the site are designed to improve students’ content knowledge of standard topics in U.S. History and to imp
Internet and Society: The Technologies and Politics of Control (2003)
This course examines current legal, political, and technical struggles for control/ownership of the global Internet and its content. The course will draw upon a growing body of cyberlaw cases and commentary, class members' research, and participation by invited guests, including lobbyists, politicians, journalists, and scholars from the HLS faculty and elsewhere. Course themes include the interaction between emerging Internet self-governance regimes and rule by traditional sovereigns; the expres
Internet and Society: The Technologies and Politics of Control (2002)
This course examines current legal, political, and technical struggles for control/ownership of the global Internet and its content. The course will draw upon a growing body of cyberlaw cases and commentary, class members' research, and participation by invited guests, including lobbyists, politicians, journalists, and scholars from the HLS faculty and elsewhere. Course themes include the interaction between emerging Internet self-governance regimes and rule by traditional sovereigns; the expres
Internet and Society
This course examines current legal, political, and technical struggles for control/ownership of the global Internet and its content. The course will draw upon a growing body of cyberlaw cases and commentary, class members' research, and participation by invited guests, including lobbyists, politicians, journalists, and scholars from the HLS faculty and elsewhere. Course themes include the interaction between emerging Internet self-governance regimes and rule by traditional sovereigns; the expres
Women Wanting to Work
Worldwide, women are influencing businesses and economies on an unprecedented scale. WIDE ANGLE's '1-800-INDIA' (2005) and 'Pickles, Inc.' (2005) give us insight into two instances of economic and social shifts being wrought by the entry of women into local and international economies. In this lesson, students will begin by examining historic photographs to determine how economic roles for women have changed in the United States. They will then look at contemporary examples of women entering the
Hitler's Germany
Hitler's Germany, or from here on out referred to as 'The Third Reich', is a course that will familiarize the student with key themes in the current historical literature involving the subject. The course breaks down to several weeks of discussion held on the main page and a paper that each student will complete on a topic of their choosing, which will then be critiqued by the class for its merit and historical content. The student taking this class will hopefully walk away with a greater unders
Science in Focus: Force and Motion: Workshop 7. The Lure of Magnetism
What is the difference between a permanent magnet and an electromagnet? In this workshop, fourth-grade students build an electromagnet by winding a wire around a rivet and attaching the ends to battery terminals. The students first predict how many washers they can pick up with the help of their electromagnet and then perform the experiment to test their predictions. After the number of washers is recorded and the results are discussed, the students engage in a group discussion about practical u
CK-12 Geometry (CA Textbook)
CK-12's Geometry delivers a full course of study in the mathematics of shape and space for the high school student, relating the ancient logic and modern applications of measurement and description to its essential elements, processes of reasoning and proof, parallel and perpendicular lines, congruence and similarity, relationships within triangles and among quadrilaterals, trigonometry of right triangles, circles, perimeter, area, surface area, volume, and geometric transformations.
This digi
