Confronting Climate Change in the Gulf Coast Region
http://www.ucsusa.org/environment/gcteachers.html
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is an independent nonprofit alliance of 50,000 concerned citizens and scientists across the country who "augment rigorous scientific analysis with innovative thinking and committed citizen advocacy to build a cleaner, healthier environment and a safer world." The Confronting Climate Change in the Gulf Coast Region curriculum guide contains ten activities related to the report of the same name, all of which can be viewed and downloaded from the site after registering for free. Geared to students in the 9-12 grade in all areas of the country, the authors write that the materials are easily adaptable for college and middle school students and are particularly suited for students living in the affected states of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Even though the UCS's environmental rhetoric reveals certain biases, all educators should find the activities and information available on their site worth looking at and sharing with their students. [JAB]
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Environment Agency: Kids [Flash]
http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/kids/
The Environment Agency of England and Wales (last mentioned in the November 24, 1999 Scout Report) Kids Web site contains several interactive environment-related activities for kids. The site has games, cartoons, and animations that help teach how we as humans affect the quality of our environment. Of special interest is the Pressure Point, Bullet Point animated activity that allows kids to read facts about the environment, energy, climate, waste, and more. A non-animated version is also available, but the fun sounds and interactivity of the animated version will definitely help keep the interest of kids, as well as inform them about these topics. [JAB]
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The Space Place: Let's Go to Mars [Flash]
http://spaceplace.jpl.nasa.gov/mars_rocket.htm
NASA's Spaceplace Web site (last mentioned in the August 14, 1998 Scout Report) has several new activities including the Let's Go to Mars interactive game. Kids learn what astronauts would need to take on the nine month mission to the red planet by choosing various items and reading why each may be good or bad in space. After loading all of your items, the spacecraft launches and then gives a score on how you did. The game is not terribly involved but will give younger students a fun way to learn and gain interest in space and space travel. [JAB]
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Teacher's Corner
http://www.nps.gov/badl/teacher/teacher.htm
From the National Park Service comes the Teachers Corner Web site on Badlands National Park. The lesson plans offered include erosion in a box, understanding rock layers, making dirt, muddying the waters, and more. Each lesson page gives a suggested grade range, key concepts, background, materials, procedure, results, and a why section that explains the scientific reasons behind the results. The pages are simple and easy to follow while containing good material that should help kids learn about geology and our national parks. [JAB]
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Physics Songs and Physics Poems
http://www.haverford.edu/physics-astro/songs/
Hosted by Haverford College and maintained by Associate Professor of Physics Walter F. Smith, the PhysicsSongs.org Web site is just that. Students and educators will find songs that have been written about such things as Gauss's Law, The Twelve Days of Newton, The Relativity Song, and more. Words are provided, and some even contain playable recordings. Who said learning isn't fun? [JAB]
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The Trivia Portal: Quizzes
http://www.funtrivia.com/cgi-bin/quizlist.cgi?type=cat&cat=9&brief=yes
Fun Trivia.com, "the World's Largest Trivia Site" includes a section of trivia quizzes devoted to science. Sixteen different quizzes are currently offered, covering topics such as the Fahrenheit Scale, Chemical Elements: Origins of Names, and How to Do Science. The quizzes are graded on a difficulty scale based on scores from the first twenty players. After a free registration, anyone can submit their own quiz, as long as it meets the ground rules and requirements. For this reason, Fun Trivia does not guarantee the accuracy of questions and answers. An appealing feature is that, once all questions are answered and the quiz is submitted, the correct answers are displayed along with the answer submitted by the player. This may be a fun activity to incorporate into science classrooms of a variety of levels. [AL]
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Reading Weather Maps
http://ww2010.atmos.uiuc.edu/(Gh)/guides/maps/home.rxml
From the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Department of Atmospheric Sciences comes the Reading Weather Maps Web site. Visitors learn how to convert their local time to the standard used by all meteorologists; to tell the difference between Kelvin, Celsius, and Fahrenheit temperatures; and how to read maps with weather data collected on and above the Earth's surface. For example, wind bards, which are flag-like symbols that indicate wind direction and wind speed, always point in the direction the wind is blowing "from." Other interesting facts, descriptions, and illustrations are available on the site. [JAB]
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Size and Scale
http://school.discovery.com/lessonplans/programs/sizeandscale/index.html
Another good lesson plan from DiscoverySchool.com, the Size and Scale Web site gives teachers a well conceived and thorough activity on the physics of size and scale. Objectives of the lesson include: understanding the relative sizes of bodies in our solar system and the problem of making a scale model of the entire solar system (because the distances in space are so great that even a very small scale model would be too large to be practical). The site contains all the information needed to complete the lesson, as well as a printable version and related links. [JAB]
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