Middle and High School … from a Montessori Point of View
The Story of Stuff is a pretty commonly used video that starts the conversation on resource use and consumerism. The video below, “Full Printed,” takes a look at the future and how technology, particularly 3-D printers, might reduce the environmental costs of the things we use.
FULL PRINTED from nueve ojos on Vimeo.
There are already some places for 3d printing.
A key tenant of Montessori is that students have an innate desire to learn, so, as a teacher, you should provide them with the things they need (prepare the environment) and then get out of the way as they discover things themselves.
In the book, The Upside of Irrationality, Dan Ariely explains from the perspective of an economist how people tend to value things more if they make it for themselves. He uses the example of oragami (and Ikea furniture that you have to assemble yourself), where he finds that people would pay more for something they made themselves, as opposed to the same thing made by someone else.
Just so, students value things more, and remember them better, if they discover them themselves.
(video via The Dish)
Here’s a neat little video, which holds the Milky Way (galactic-centric) steady as the Earth rotates relative to it.
For comparison, here’s the original video by Stephane Guisard and Jose Francisco Salgado, showing the geocentric view of the sky moving:
It is always revelatory to see things from unexpected perspectives. Brian Swimme was amazed by the immensity of it when he first truly recognized that he was standing on a planet that was rotating through space orbiting the Sun.
I’ve always been struck by the opposite point of view. To think that if you hold still enough, and think about it a bit, from one point of view you could be the central reference point for the entire universe, with everything else moving relative to you: the Earth still beneath your feet; the Sun (almost) orbiting around you; and the planets arcing through their epicycles.
This one’s for the nerds. It’s hard to argue against the elegance of using tau instead of pi. Natalie Wolchover explains, while Kevin Houston makes the argument in video:
This is the first of an excellent series covering the history of English from The Open University. They make for a great spark-the-imagination lesson for etymology.
There’s lots more interesting videos at The Open University’s YouTube channel.
(via The Dish)
Except that you can hear the dust and small rocks banging on your spacecraft.
from JPL.
I try not to post things with anything approaching obscene language, but sometimes, as in this piece, called “Storm” by Tim Minchin, it’s a small part in the service of a much bigger, more significant idea. Anyway, this one might not be for the kids.
The BBC has an excellent article on the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) launched on the second to last shuttle flight to investigate the origins of the universe. NASA’s page is giving regular updates.
What’s nice is that the basic physics of magnetic spectrometers, where magnets are used to deflect the motion of charged particles, should be accessible to middle school students once they get into electricity and magnetism.
Transition Radiation Detector determines highest-energy particle velocities
Silicon Trackers follow particle paths; how they bend reveals their charge
Permanent Magnet is core component of AMS and makes particles curve
Time-of-flight Counters determine lowest-energy particle velocities
Star Trackers scan star fields to establish AMS’s orientation in space
Cerenkov Detector makes accurate velocity measurements of fast particles
Electromagnetic Calorimeter measures energy of impacting particles
Anti-coincidence Counter filters signal from unwanted side particles— Amos (2011): Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer to go on Endeavour shuttle on the BBC.
For additional information, that really gets into the nuts and bolts, you can go CERN’s technical site or get more general info at their public site, which has a wonderful set of videos and animations.