Earth Clock

Found this here:
http://www.poodwaddle.com/clocks/earthclock/

There are a bunch more free embeddable clocks and applets on the site.  Useful for Science, Social Science, Geography etc.

Cheers

Ruth

Extreme weather events of 2010: slideshow

It's always worth mining a site that has tossed up one useful thing as it's likely to have others.  Along with the infographics I told you about a while ago, Good.is has slideshows, such as this one with excellent images and content on extreme weather events of 2010 - snow! drought! volcanoes! - and more.

Another one to share with your Science, Geography and Earth and Environment teachers. You could also suggest that students could do their own versions, sourcing their own images and content in this 12-slide format.

Cheers

Ruth

Image source is Flickr: Volcanic Eruption Eyjafjallajökull.  Click on the image to go to the photographer's photostream.  Creative Commons licensed.

What is the view from the top of the Eiffel Tower?

Fancy you asking that.  I have the answer right here.

and if you toddle on over to the Arounder site by clicking here, you can take a 360 degree tour of the view.  One to share with your languages teachers?

The Arounder site has 360 degree tours of art museums, world cities and more.  Here's a glimpse of the Asia/Pacific/elsewhere selection:

If you'd like to take a squizz at the hometown of this blog, Sydney, there are twenty options, not only the (expected) Sydney Opera House.

If you want something more astronomical, how about Mars or the Moon?

So one for LOTE teachers, art teachers, geography teachers, science teachers and more.  Share it!

Cheers

Ruth

Found via Twitter.  @brainpicker consistently comes up with a whole bunch of great links.  Definitely worth following.

Powering a lightbulb: Infographics

Are you looking for some dandy graphics to explain ideas to your students (or are your teaching colleagues looking to you to do this??)?

Good.is has some useful transparencies, including this one.  Site link.  Image only.
Share this with your Science, Geography, Maths etc teaching colleagues, then investigate what else you can find on the site to share among their infographics (some fairly US-centric, but not all).

Cheers

Ruth

The Joy of Statistics

For all the dross and muck and pointless stuff on YouTube, there are also gems.  Here's one to share with your colleagues in Maths, Science, Social Science, and anyone else teaching students about statistics - a one hour BBC documentary with Dr Hans Rosling.  Free and available on YouTube.  Bargain.

EDITED: Hmmm.  YouTube playing games; this seems to have gone 'private' since I drafted this blog entry.

You can find the video embedded here:
http://www.gapminder.org/videos/the-joy-of-stats/
and it played when I just checked it.  Other related videos on that page, too.



Original YouTube link here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOOmqHzkkOo

Remind your teachers to load this ahead of the lesson, so they're not waiting for it to load as they show it.

Found via the Laughing Squid.

Cheers

Ruth

The Periodic Table made real

From the wonderful resource that is the SLAV blog, Bright Ideas (over there in my bloglist too, so check them out anytime you are visiting Skerricks to see their latest entry), comes the link to this resource, which not only shows the periodic table:

but also shows you what these elements are used for.  Bismuth, anyone?

It's one of the free resources offered by BP - they have a browsable catalogue of secondary level resources here with a focus on Business, Geography and Science (and aligned to UK curricula).  Maybe one to send on to your teachers in those areas?  If you want a site with more specific technical detail on elements, ChemiCool has some ads, but also comprehensive data.

A Science teacher pal who reads Skerricks and has more than once pointedly pointed out that I'm a bit light on in the Science-y stuff, should be happy as a pig in mud now!  Look!! Authentic real Science-y entry, right here!

Cheers

Ruth

PS.  Couldn't help myself....  ;-)

Image source

Climate change games

Looking for some climate change games for a colleague doing climate change/greenhouse effect etc with Year 8, I came across a few likely looking prospects.  I haven't entirely played all these, but they looked promising.

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Electrocity

http://www.electrocity.co.nz/

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From New Zealand, this game of 150 turns (but you can take them FAST to grow your city) offers development options and choices - stay green? get big? and the players need to keep their choices supplied with electricity. Games can be saved, and there are viewable examples of other people's cities to see various possibilities. Lots of scope in this one - let kids loose, or maybe set some to grow a metropolis, others to set up an ecologically sustainable place (that is also still economically viable).  Students should pay attention to the hints tab...  I used this one with a class group, and it's now VERY popular at lunchtimes too - engaging/challenging enough for students to want to play it more to increase their scores and skill.

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Let's learn why the earth's climate is changing

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http://www.eschooltoday.com/climate_change_class.html

Although this one looks more aimed at primary school level audiences than secondary, it covers a bunch of issues visually and engagingly, and could be useful with younger/lower secondary classes.

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Stablization Wedges

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http://www.princeton.edu/wedges/Stabilization_Wedges_Game_w8_Oct07.pdf

This one is a board game rather than online, with a 16-page pdf giving you the playing pieces etc.  Having outlined a variety of strategies to level off global warming (eg. wind farms), players then need to select their choice of wedges.

There is a slideshow about the options here:

http://www.princeton.edu/~cmi/resources/CMI_Resources_new_files/CMI_Stab_Wedges_Movie.swf

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Climate Challenge

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/hottopics/climatechange/climate_challenge/

From the BBC, this requires players over several turns to balance out politics and choices to see the impact of these on climate (and voters).  I'd recommend the tutorial on this one, so students understand what is required and how the game works.

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Among the sources from which I found these are a links page here and one here and the Wikipedia article on global warming games.  All of these offer a bunch more links and ideas on the greenhouse effect, climate change, global warming and so forth and so on.

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Cheers

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Ruth

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PS If you have any other recommendations along similar lines, do please add them in a comment, with the URL, so others can benefit.

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GIFSL*: 24. World Time Clocks

A long time ago, when the world was young, somewhere I saw the idea for having some clocks in the library with world time on them.  So I bought some inexpensive clocks, and they went up on the wall - they've been there for several years.  When we painted the internal foyer, the clocks went back up on the wall.

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The places underneath vary, we change them from time to time.  The basic plan is to have a place from North or South America, one from Europe, and one from Asia, to show the variation in time around the globe.  It's a bit geography, a bit world citizen, a bit, something to see in the library.  Opposite these is the library clock with OUR time on it.  We've had some interesting conversations about day/night and times in places, with the kids.

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Recently, at Lisa's high school library, I saw her take on this.  She'd seen ours, and went back to her library with her own spin on the idea, including this:

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Lisa added a map, and the time difference.  Clever!  It's great to watch an idea evolving, as people pick it up and make it their own.  Ian's done the clock thing too, in his primary school library - read more on his blog here.

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What you need: three clocks (or more) - and they don't need to cost much, Ikea or two dollar shops or discount department stores have them for under $10 each.  Some idea of the places you're going to highlight.  Batteries.  Oh, and a memory, so you change the time when daylight saving starts/finishes, if you have daylight saving in your part of the world... There are plenty of easy world time websites to check for correct times.

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Cheers, Ruth

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GIFSL = Good Ideas For School Libraries
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Google Ocean

Some time ago, a scientist said to one of the Google Earth team, "You've done a great job with the dirt - but what about the water?"


The latest upgrade to Google Earth is Google Ocean. One feature is an historical one - eg. watch the effect on the coast of Hurricane Ike.

Another feature, Historical Imagery, provides the ability to scroll back through decades of satellite images and watch the spread of suburbia or erosion of coasts.


Click a function called Touring and you can create narrated, illustrated tours, on land or above and below the sea surface, describing and showing things like a hike or scuba excursion, or even a research cruise on a deep-diving submarine.

Read about the changes and possibilities in a New York Times article here.

Google Earth's page for educators is here.  Google Ocean is in Google Earth 5.0, so check your current version if the ocean options aren't there.

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Strange maps

Had you thought of comparing the size of China's provinces (population-wise) with other countries of the world? Nope? Don't need to. This entry from the Strange Maps blog has done it.

There are more things in heaven and earth (and in the blogosphere), Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.*

One to share with the Geography teachers at your school, or just keep an eye on for your own fascination. Maybe a library display possibility, strange map of the week?

*With apologies to Shakespeare, and Hamlet.

Image source

Catchment Detox

Catchment Detox from the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corp.):

It’s an online game where the player manages a virtual river catchment. It’s not a pristine catchment, there is agriculture, industry and tourism already in place. There are also environmental problems that need to be fixed. The game goes for 50 turns and you make as many changes to the landscape as you like (you can also do none!) before taking your next turn. The aim is to create an environmentally happy catchment with a sustainable and thriving economy.


Home page is here.

Teacher info page is here (thanks, ABC!)

There's a competition running right now that finishes in two weeks (early Sept 2008) but I haven't yet found any indication of whether they'll leave the game after that (hope they do).

NationStates: online simulation game

To quote from the website:

NationStates is a free nation simulation game. Build a nation and run it according to your own warped political ideals. Create a Utopian paradise for society's less fortunate or a totalitarian corporate police state. Care for your people or deliberately oppress them. Join the World Assembly or remain a rogue state. It's up to you.

Haven't yet created my own nation with it, but it has potential for History/Society and Culture/Geography (so I've pointed those teachers at it so they can see if it's useful). It was devised as a ploy to draw attention to a novel (Jennifer Government by Max Barry).

Check it out by clicking here.