Exploratorium Teacher Institute
High School Science Summer Institute
2012
Schedule
1. June 25 Introduction
Welcome, Floor tour, introduction to the shop.
Summer Institute web resources http://www.exploratorium.edu/ti/alumni/ , This site links to all the activities we do on the museum floor, and in the morning and afternoon classes.
login name teacher
password institute
The Exploratorium website is: http://www.exploratorium.edu
The Exploratorium website was the first website made by a science museum. Webmaster Ron Hipschman created it in 1993, it was the 600th or so website made.
Today it has over 40,000 html pages and adds 5 new pages a day.
String crossing Stretch a string outward from your nose, what do you see?
Master Eye Find out if you have a dominant eye.
Head Harp Wrap a string aroud your head, pull the two ends together and pull the string tight, pluck it, what do you hear?
extras
June 26 Perception
Disagreeing About Color,When two people look at the same thing do they see the same color?
Find the Highest Note, a simply impossible challenge
Gray Step What do you see?
Lateral inhibition definition from Wikipedia.
Cafe Wall
Bright Black
Marilyn Einstein Change your distance from this image and the person portrayed changes.
The Moon Illusion Why does the moon near the horizon look larger than it does when overhead? The two moons are exactly the same size.
Size Constancy The size an object appears does not depend entirely on the size of its image on your retina.
Going Further
Project LITE Boston University, a great collection of interactive illusions.
What is Science? Perception PD
Ambiguous Cube What do you see?
Afternoon Loudness
Decibel Meters How to use a decibel meter.
Decibel meters are available for Apple and android phones:
Android: Sound Meter free
Apple: Decibel Meter Pro $0.99
June 27 Perception
Laser Speckle Say what YOU see!
Master Eye Find your dominant eye.
Moon Illusion The full moon appears larger at moonrise and moonset, and yet it is measured to be the same size as when overhead.
Size Constancy Look at and measure the size of a person as they double their distance from 4 paces away to 8 paces away. Your perception of size of a person depends on your perception of the distance to the person.
Angular Size The mathemics of radians.
Depth Spinner
Eye Disection
Afternoon mirror images
Finding Images in a mirror point at an object from two different places, to find its location in space.
Right vs Left in a mirror Why do mirrors reverse right and left but not up and down? What they really do is reverse in and out.
June 28 RAFT
Magnetism Includes the images from the powerpoint.
June 29 Eye
July 2 Light and Color
A short version of the color clas can be found here Color
Project a spectrum Use a diffraction grating and an overhead projector.
Holographic diffraction gratings can be purchased inexpensively from Edmund Scientific
A project Star Spectrometer can be found at Wards Scientific
Snack Colored Shadows The new colored compact fluorescents lamps are great for the colored shadows activity.
Bird in a Cage snack
Benham's Disk Snack
A set of great links about seeing
part 2
What is light? click here for the entire lesson
Disappearing Glass Rods snack
Bridge Light snack
an entire lesson on light interference
an entire lesson on polarization
July 3 Sound
July 5 Biology tools
July 6 Size and Scale
July 9 Physics tools
July 10 Assessment
Downhill Racer objects rolling down a low angle inclined plane accelerate slowly.
Blinky Light, use blinking lights and timelapse images to quanify motion.
July 11 Technology
Applications for Science Teachers
Afternoon Spectra
Spectra Explorations, an introduction the the spectra of common light sources.
Project a spectrum, Use a diffraction grating and an overhead projector to project a spectrum
Project a rainbow with a CD, reflect sunlight into a shadowed white screen and observe a spectrum.
View a spectrum in a CD Look at a minimag light reflected in a compact disk to see a spectrum.
Make a spectrometer Use a cardboard tube and a compact disk to make a spectrometer
Peel CD Peel the aluminizing off a compact disk to make a transmission diffraction grating
Energy Level Model Use the positions of the center of mass of a stool to model atomic energy levels
The Bohr Atom Use a gravity well to model the energy levels in a bohr atom.
July 12 Size and Scale
Biology Explorations with Charlie and Katie
Astronomy explortions with Linda
Afternoon
Circuits Use meters to make simple measurements of electric circuits: voltge, current, and resstance.
Flying tinsel Use electrostatics to fly a piece of tinsel.
Tape Electroscope Use scotch tape to figue out the sign of the net electric charge on an object.
Explorations from 2011
Day 1 questions and suggestions.
Mobius activities:
A mathematician confided
That a Möbius band is one-sided,
And you'll get quite a laugh,
If you cut one in half,
For it stays in one piece when divided.Mobius introductory article From the magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction by Paul Doherty and Pat Murphy
Mobius An introduction to the mobius strip and the observation that counting is difficult even when you are deciding whether a count is 1 or 0.
Mobius Dissection, examine what results when you cut a mobius strip along its length.
Mobius Decay, Find the conservation laws when a mobius strip decays by fissioning.
Mobius collisions, Find the conservation laws for mobius strips when they collide.
2. June 27 What is Science, Perception and Measurement
AM What is Science?
Cups of Mystery and Pieces of the Puzzle. LS
PM What is Measurement
Measurement without tools Katie Ward
Make a Microcaliper Don Rathjen
Day 2 questions and suggestions
Geller Huchra mapping
Margaret Geller in Wikipedia includes the first Geller Huchra map.
3. June 28 Observing the World
AM The Eye
The Eye PD
Cow eye dissection Explainers
PM Microscopes
iPhone Microscope Julie Yu
Day 3 comments and suggestions
Conic sections
4. June 29 Light and Color
Filters LS
Comments and Suggestions
Color Essay Magazine of Fantasy and Sciene Fiction. PD
CIE Color Chromaticity Diagram
Fresnel lenses.
5. June 30 Images
Images PD
Anamorphic Art Julie Yu, Don Rathjen
Comments and Suggestions
Introduction to Fresnel lenses.
6. July 1 Cycles and Time
Biological Cycles Katie Ward
Rock and Water Cycles Eric Muller
Astronomy Cycles LS
Water Cycle PD
Outdoor Exploratorium
Dinner
7. July 5 Evolution
Cosmology
Gravity Well Model of the tides
Orbits in gravity wells with different shapes
MR diagram PD Plot the mass versus radius o objects in the Universe.
HR Diagram LS
The number of stars in the neighborhood of the sun versus spectral types.
The smallest star we have seen is 0.1 solar masses the largest is 100 solar masses.
Geology PD , Eric Muller
Biology Katie Ward
Enzyme Simulation Katie Ward
Biology Charlie Carlson
http://www.exo.net/bioscicharlie/BioSciCharlie/Teaching_Activities/Teaching_Activities.html
Demonstrating Natural Selection Using Magnetic Bacteria PD
Amazon listing of Keyless Lamp Socket Adapter
Einsteins Messengers Movie and lesson plans on gravity waves.
8. July 6 RAFT Pinholes and Magnetism
Magnetism PD
Pinhole Eric Muller
9. July 7 Atom
Moonphases LS
Julie Yu's activities on her site near the bottm of her page http://www.exo.net/~jyu/summer2011
Toys from Trash Site Modesto Tamez
10. Teacher Share-a-thon
Amy Holloway Schwartz Adapted for Survival
Manzar Bouyancy
Jennie Serra Guidry Conic Activity
Janice Valletta Mendelyev's Cards
Nancy Density Challenge Student Teacher
Karen Mathews Rube Goldberg Machine Form
Ty Fredericks Iron Science Teacher Magnetic Eddy Currents
Jeffrey Herbst Snack Tectonics
Katherine Lemmi
Heather Tyan Ball Pass and Dot Game Dot Game Powerpoint
Amber Lancaster Monster Mash Genetics Monster mash instructions Monster mash mp3
Dan Webre phytoplankton
William Katzman Homopolar
Joanie Le Cleaning Acid Rain
http://directoryvietnam.com/Halong-Bay-Vietnam.jpg
http://www.mccullagh.org/db9/d30-25/luray-caverns-wishing-water.jpg
Heather Tynan shares a great website Teach Engineering
Beth Cutter
Mentos and Soda Inquiry Teacher Notes
Mitosis Guessing Game cards docx Mitosis Guessing Game Cards pdf
Cell Structures Guessing Game Doc
Lenore Kenny Observation/Provocation Invisible Marble
Crystal Mitchell Cool Math Games Towers of Hanoi, Eight Queens, Knight Switch
Eric Martin Single Pendulum Double Pendulum
Glen Geiss Speaker Building Doc Speaker building pdf Speaker checklist
Jeremy Young Simple Speaker
Kati Ward Flower seed and dissection
Introduction
Welcome to the on-line companion to the Exploratorium Summer Institute for High School Science teachers.
Each Institute consist of a series of hands-on workshops taught at Exploratorium Exhibits and in classrooms using inexpensive versions of Exploratorium exhibits.
Year 2011 is the twenty-seventh year of Physics Summer Institutes.
Each day begins with pastry, fruit and coffee.
While we feed our bodies, we feed our minds
too.
We discuss questions of life, the universe and everything.
We look for questions that students ask and for strategies to answer
them.
After we're fed, we head out to the floor of the Exploratorium to explore scientific phenomena at museum exhibits.
After some time exploring exhibits, we return to the classroom to use inexpensive versions of Exploratorium exhibits known as, "Snacks" to explore the phenomena of science. In my classes I use facilitated exploration to guide the teachers to a deeper understanding of science. By modeling this approach I hope the teachers will use it in their classes.
Teachers use Scotch Magic Tape to explore electric charge.
After the classroom explorations, the teachers are
turned loose to learn on their own.
They go to the Exploratorium Learning Studio where information
professionals help them to find resources for science teaching.
They go to the Teacher Machine shop where they build their own
classroom versions of Exploratorium exhibits.
They prepare lessons which they present to their colleague teachers
every Friday during the Summer Institute.
And, they talk with each other and with the Exploratorium Staff,
sharing their teaching experiences.
The Web Pages
The following web pages contain a sample of the material I use in the Physics Summer Institute. It has been posted quickly to provide a resource for teachers. I am always adding images, rewriting, and reorganizing the material to make it easier to use.
This material is in draft form!
As you do these explorations, write me with your comments and questions. pauld@exploratorium.edu
Now, grab some food and a beverage then join me exploring nature with the activities and explorations from the Summer Institute.
In our workshops we provide many simple materials, these are stored in rolling carts.
Here are the contents of our carts: TI Carts
Scientific Explorations with Paul Doherty |
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22 May 2011 |