Archive for the Category ◊ Science ◊

04 Apr 2010 Science Bob
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Science  | Leave a Comment

Science Bob is a great site to have fun with science. It includes science fair ideas, with an emphasis on the scientific method and resources. There is also a Science Q&A with the question (and answer) of the week as well as an archive of previous questions. Students are invited to ask Science Bob a question. ”Science Bob” Pflugfelder has been a fan of science since he was just six years old. He is a celebrity science teacher and owns the science mobile. The main feature of his website is a collection of videos presenting cool science experiments.

11 Mar 2010 15 Resources to Improve Your Math and Science Knowledge
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Mathematics, Science  | 2 Comments

The following list of math and science tools include resources for homework help, keeping up with research and news in the field, and reviewing basic concepts and applications. You can share them with your students as lesson plans or extra test prep, and bookmark them yourself when you want to improve your own math and science knowledge.

  1. Math Sciences and Resources: This toolset from NASA includes proficiency tests, physics questions and more educational materials for K-12 students and teachers.
  2. MIT OpenCourseWare: If you’re not already using the free course materials, lecture notes, videos and audio features supplied by MIT through its opencourseware program, you’re missing out. The web resource includes materials for all subjects, but is especially rich in math and the sciences, from engineering to health sciences to technology to chemistry and more.
  3. Texas Instruments Free Downloads: Texas Instruments’ collection of free downloads provides you and your students with review tools and games at all levels. Find apps and computer software, games, and more, for all different operating systems.
  4. ACT Test Prep: You don’t have to be training students for the ACT to use all the practice questions on this site. It includes math and science review for anyone at the high school level.
  5. Math.com: This mathematics website features a homework help page, practice page, games, and collection of calculators and tools. You can use the math worksheet generator to customize review sheets for your students or for yourself, in pre-algebra, algebra, everyday math, advanced math, calculus, and more.
  6. ScienceDaily: Visit this authoritative website for research news in the sciences and in mathematics. You can watch and share videos, read articles, view images, and learn about math and science books, experiments, researchers and technology.
  7. MathDL: The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) Mathematical Sciences Digital Library offers the public all kinds of resources for learning about math in the news, subscribing to RSS feeds, collecting library resources, discussing math topics with other community members, and more.
  8. Scientific American: The web version of this prestigious science journal includes blogs, features, letters to the editor, news stories, special in-depth reports, image gallery, videos, a “fact or fiction” feature, and other resources for you and your students. Science topics covered range from basic science to space to evolution to the mind and brain to energy and sustainability, and others.
  9. Free Online Textbooks, Lecture Notes, Tutorials, and Videos on Mathematics: This page from NYU lists free online resources for studying math, including textbooks, software, lecture notes and more, dealing with numerical analysis, calculus, number theory, statistics and general mathematics.
  10. Discovery: The Discovery Channel’s website is a huge resource for anyone interested in learning more about math and science, from technology to the natural world. There are also lots of games and interactive features that will help students learn about animals, NASA, evolution and the environment.
  11. Jefferson Lab Games and Puzzles: Jefferson Lab’s group of resources includes games and puzzles for understanding math, numbers, science vocabulary, science concepts and more.
  12. National Geographic: Similar to Discovery.com, the National Geographic website provides teachers and students with a fun, interactive and free opportunity to study the natural world and history. You can watch TV shows online, too.
  13. Cramster.com: This homework help site has collected thousands of resources for students working on biology, physics, computer science, chemistry, math and engineering, from equation sheets to practice exams to outlines to video lectures.
  14. Science.gov: This government-sponsored resource is a searchable site of over 40 databases and 2,000 websites. You can perform an advanced search or browse categories like science education, natural resources, agriculture and food, biology and nature, and beyond.
  15. Project Euclid: Project Euclid is a collection of math and statistics resources, particularly math journals online from places like the University of Michigan.

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Alvina Lopez, who writes on the topics of accredited online colleges.  She welcomes your comments at her email Id: alvina.lopez@gmail.com.

31 Jan 2010 Science Of The Olympic Winter Games
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Lesson Planning, Literacy, Mathematics, Physical Education, Science  | 2 Comments

Science Of The Olympic Winter GamesIs your class excited about the Winter Olympic Games approaching? If you are mathematics, science or physical education teacher, you might want to explain the physics behind all the sports presented at the Winter Olympic Games. NBC has created a video series entitled “Science of the Olympic Winter Games” and Lessonopoly has created student activities and lesson plans to support that video series. By completing these activities with your students, they will learn about friction, movement, momentum, center of gravity, chemistry of material and many more. The activities are aimed at students grade 6 to 9. Some of the subjects include : Aerial Skiing, Slapshot Physics, Cross-Country Skiing, Competition Suits, The Science of Skis, The Science of Skates, Science of Friction in Curling and many more. What a great way to get athletic students more interested in science.

28 Jan 2010 Primary Games Arena
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: English, Foreign Language, Geography, History, Information Technology, Kindergarden, Language, Mathematics, Music, Physical Education, Reading, Science, Social Studies  | One Comment

Primary Games ArenaIf you are looking for a very large collection of on-line education games, Primary Games Arena has to be one of the largest I have ever seen. It is a compilation of hundreds of Flash based education games about Math, English, Science, Physical Education, Music, Spanish, German, French, Religion Education, ICT, History, Geography, Art and Design, Citizenship and Technology. All the games are also sorted by grade levels (based on the UK educational system) or game types. The games are not necessarily hosted by the Primary Games Arena, but they link to only kids-appropriate games. The API let game developers feed scores from their games straight onto Primary Games Arena. I strongly recommend this site if your students need to learn while playing.

19 Jan 2010 Technoscience
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Mathematics, Science  | One Comment

TechnoscienceIf you are looking for a very inspirational science teacher, I recommend that you visit Britt Gow’s Technoscience blog. She is a  Science and Maths teacher at a small, rural P12 College in southwest Victoria, Australia. Her blog has a large amount of entries all presenting science activities that she has done at her school. It is a great way to find new ideas on how to enhance science learning in your classroom. It includes ideas for Year 7, Year 8 and Year 9 in mathematics and science (based on the Australian School system). The subjects are varied and are all good ideas on how to apply scientific principles in context. I think this blog is a gem.

13 Jan 2010 Bright Minds Share the Light
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Physics, Science  | Leave a Comment

Bright Minds Share the Light“Bright Minds Share the Light” is a nice collection of teacher information and student activities about Light and Shadows. The resources are written collaboratively by Valerie Barnes, Louis Cheng and Louis Cheng at the Calgary Science School. Topics include : What Is Light?, Where Does Light Come From?,  What Can Light Do? and How Do We See? Students will learn about colours, energy, reflection, and the structure of the eyes. The website is aimed at elementary school students. The lessons are very well organized in a nice table of content. I strongly recommend that you look at this site if you are teaching about energy or light.

17 Dec 2009 I know that
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Arts, Kindergarden, Kindergarten, Lesson Planning, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies, Technology  | Leave a Comment

“I know that” is a great site to access fun learning activities about math, the arts, social learning, science, language arts and social studies. It is also possible to access the learning activities by grade (for pre-kindergarten to grade 6).  The activities are very visually attractive and user-friendly. To experience the activity, you need to open an account. You can get a free guest limited account that includes advertisement. The advertisements do not seem to target children. By subscribing to a paid account, you can eliminate the ads and have access to many premium member features. With the teacher’s paid account, you can even track the progress of your students. The site also promotes “social learning” by encouraging users to create an avatar and posting about their successes.

25 Nov 2009 Inquiry in Action
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Physics, Science  | Leave a Comment

“Inquiry in Action” is a project of the American Chemical Society and in composed of a Guide to Inquiry Investigations in Physical Science. It includes and entirely free PDF book about investigation in elementary school science. It is a resource of guided, inquiry-based activities that covers basic chemistry concepts along with the process of scientific investigation. It includes activities about the physical properties and physical change in solids and liquids, dissolving solids, liquids, and gases, chemical changes, states of matter and density. The document is made for the US curriculum and it includes links with teaching standards in all the 50 states. You can download each part separately or you can download the entire document as a PDF.

25 Sep 2009 Seasons in the Northern Hemisphere of planet Earth
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Geography, Science  | Leave a Comment

This link gives teachers an incredible option to work in class by means of images of the countryside showing changes from winter through to winter again. The sound track provides background music and sounds related to the seasons, which is really catchy for students.

This clip would support learning about the planet Earth and the changing seasons experienced by the northern hemisphere. The teacher can also compare the aforementioned to the southern hemisphere and how changes take place.  It could also be used as a stimulus for creative writing about the turning of the seasons and climate.

Note : This video is not available from every country. You may not be able to access it if your country is not authorized by the BBC.

16 Sep 2009 All about plants
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Biology, Environment, Science  | 2 Comments

all-about-plantsAll about plants is a simple Flash animation with a bee as the main character. The bee will teach the student about the growth of the plant, the parts of a plant and pollination. There are also some activities, a challenge, multiple choice quiz and some links to other plant web sites.

10 Sep 2009 The Periodic Table of Videos
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Chemistry, Science  | Leave a Comment

periodic-table-videos

The Periodic Table of Videos is a modern version of the famous periodic table of elements. It is perfect for your chemistry classes. It is maintained by the University of Nottingham in England. When loading the page, there is the traditional periodic table. Each of the 118 elements is clickable. By clicking on one, you will get the usual information like the name of the element and the atomic number, but there will also be a YouTube video embedded. The video will give information about the element presented by a scientist and then some sort of experiment using that element. Sometimes, the experiment is an impressive one like the famous sodium in water. Did you know the body of a pencil sharpener is made of magnesium? This is one of the many things your students will learn from this website.

20 Aug 2009 “Science Myths” in K-6 Textbooks
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Mathematics, Physics, Science  | Leave a Comment

“Science Myths” in K-6 Textbooks and Popular culture is a cool website listing articles with lists of concepts that are usually explained poorly in textbooks used in elementary school. Although the accent is mostly on physics, there are a few articles on other subjects as well such as chemistry, archeology and astronomy. As an example, did you know that filled and empty balloons on a balance beam cannot directly demonstrate air’s weight? Did you also know that the Earth’s North Pole actually resides in the southern hemisphere? By riding all the articles listed on this website, you should be available those scientific misconceptions in your classroom. It is well worth the read. The website looks like it was designed in the 90′s but the information is all there. Have fun!

19 Aug 2009 Google Earth Lessons
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Geography, Language, Mathematics, Science  | One Comment

Google Earth LogoIf you are already using Google Earth and you want some ideas on how to better integrate it in your classroom, “Google Earth Lessons” is a great blog with many lesson plans. The lessons are divided in four categories. The first one includes “Google Earth How To’s” to let you learn the basis of using the application. All the “How-To’s” are presented in the form of a QuickTime tutorial.  The second category includes lessons where the student controls the application himself to learn various concepts. The third category focuses on teacher controlled lessons suitable for lectures, presentations and whole class discussions. The last category is a list of mini-lessons that you may use as starters for longer lessons in your classroom. The site will let you search for lessons by specific subjects such as social studies, math, science and language arts. Nice little icons are used to indicate whether each lesson includes a QuickTime video, a Word file, a PDF document or a WMV video. I hope you will use this blog to get more acquainted with that great application that will let your students travel right from their computer.

07 Apr 2009 Building Circuits
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Physics, Science  | Leave a Comment

Building CircuitsThis Flash animation is a great way to teach electrical circuits to elementary school students. It will help students make the link between components of actual circuits and electrical symbols. After learning what each symbol means, the student can then draw circuit diagrams by dragging symbols of components. It is very simple, but exactly what is needed for elementary school students.

05 Apr 2009 Interactive Autopsy
Author: Dominic Tremblay |  Category: Biology, Science  | Leave a Comment

Interactive AutopsyBe careful, this site is not for everyone and should only be used with mature students. Interactive Autopsy is a step-by-step demonstration of what happens during an autopsy procedure. In the first step, the student will do the external examination to then move to the internal examination. Then the student will look at the internal organs by removing them. Then it is time for removing the brain and weighing all the organs. Then to finish the autopsy, it is time to return the organs to the body and sewing it up. All the steps are done interactively by dragging and clicking with the mouse. This site is easy to understand and great for students with interest in forensic science or who are big fans of CSI.

« Previous Entries