In my grade 10 Science class I recently gave my students an introductory microscope lab, and in my haste I used a “canned” lab from a textbook. Although there are some good activities in this lab, students are presented with a number of equations for determining FOV and magnification, including:
Even though I am not in the US, SOPA/PIPA will have an international impact. So today I post this video. If you are in the US, please contact your elected representatives and and let them know the negative impact it will have.
I have heard people say that hey would love to have lived in the renaissance, when all that new knowledge was being discovered, that it must have been such an interesting time. Perhaps. But please – this is the 21st Century, folks!
How many of you remember this from the movie Wayne’s World:
OK… First I’ll access the secret military spy satelite that is in geosynchronous orbit over the midwest. Then I’ll ID the limo by the vanity plate “MR. BIGGG” and get his approximate position. Then I’ll reposition the transmission dish on the remote truck to 17.32 degrees east, hit WESTAR 4 over the Atlantic, bounce the signal back into the aerosphere up to COMSAT 6, beam it back to SATCOM 2 transmitter number 137 and down on the dish on the back of Mr. Big’s limo… It’s almost too easy.
David Damberger is with Engineers without Borders, and in this TEDx talk he emphasizes the need to recognize and report failure, in order to avoid its repetition.
Back in October I posted about my foray into non-traditional instruction, wherein the students in my grade 9 Science class wrote letters in order to take civic action regarding invasive species. Well, the replies have started coming in, and the kids are pretty pumped. We have received replies from the City of Toronto parks department, and the CEO of Sheridan Nurseries, the largest chain of garden centres in the region.
Eric Mazur gives a terrific, evidence based explanation of what is wrong with lecturing as a primary source of knowledge transfer, and what to do about it. I really like his explanation, about 51 minutes in, that the better we understand the material, the harder it is for us to teach, because we become more removed from what it was like to learn it the first time.
Because of the vagaries of the calendar, school goes late in December this year. As a result, everyone is frazzled, and a not insignificant number of students have already left for the holidays*. As a result, I needed to come up with things that would be meaningful, but not indispensable. And fun – partly to keep the kids engaged, but also, maybe just a little, to make the early vacationers a touch jealous. So here are some of the things I did:
1. With my Grade 9’s, since we are working on the Chemistry unit, we did a Great Periodic Table of the Elements Bingo Scavenger Hunt! And yes, the exclamation mark is part of the title. The class is divided into teams of three or four, and each team is given a large periodic table and a bingo marker. The rules are: Continue reading
Here’s a great little video on the nano world, narrated by Stephen Fry. Enjoy!
Much of what is covered in introductory Science is simplified. It is simplified for a reason – the full explanation is complex, involves higher level mathematics, or concepts that have yet to be learned. In most cases I explain to my students that we are working with a simplified model that is sufficient to manipulate the concepts at the level we will be working at, but that if they go on to study this discipline in later years, the topic will be revisited and elaborated. Some keeners want to know more, and I am happy to explain things at a higher level to those who are curious.
I have often referred to DNA as the cell’s “hard drive” – it is an information storage medium, but does not itself process the information. Recently a student in an introductory course asked how that information is used, so I extended the digital analogy this way:
On your hard drive, information is stored magnetically. The direction of the magnetic field designates a binary coding system of 1’s and 0’s. So let’s say the following sequence is stored on your hard drive:
01010100010010000100100101010011001000000100100101010011001000000100 000100100000010100000101001001001111010101000100 01010100100101001110
