Great Science Sites

One of my favorite and probably the most informative blogs that I read is one written by Richard Byrne, a teacher in rural America. His "Free Tech for Teachers" blog is a wealth of information. This week- he is recapping resources by content area. Following are great SCIENCE sites(other content areas will follow) :

The Forces of Nature website provides a nice list of complete lesson plans for teachers of students in grades K through 12. The site is based on a film produced by National Geographic designed to educate students about volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, and tornadoes. The film apparently is still available on Amazon.com. But even without the movie, most of the lesson plans and activities are still very usable. You can even "create" volcanoes, tornadoes, earthquakes - very cool!

The US Department of Energy has a good collection of resources for teachers and students. The lesson plans found on the education page range from simple one page, ten minute activities to lesson plans that will take a day or more to complete.

Science Buddies is a great resource for science teachers and students. The site includes, project ideas, "ask an expert", resources and competition tips. It is worth the time to check this one out.

A research facility called Jefferson Lab is a great place to find educational online games and puzzles. The games from Jefferson Lab are great practice for applying science and math knowledge to problem solving. The site also has a great Teacher Resources page full of lesson plans for hands-on activities, study pages, and reference materials.

Phun is a project of a graduate student at Umea University in Sweden. The idea behind Phun is to create software that can used to create 2-D animations of physics concepts. The software allows users to create simple animations to demonstrate physics concepts. The playful synergy of science and art is novel, and makes Phun as educational as it is entertaining. I had fun watching the demo video and would love someone to "test" this with kids- It is a free download-If there are any "takers" out there, let me know.

The United Nations Environment Program has constructed a Google Maps mashup to displaying more than one hundred examples of environmental change. Each placemark on the map has close-up views of the land and a story about environmental change at that location. For example clicking on a placemark will reveal close-up imagery of the site and detailed information about the environmental changes taking place. Users of the UNEP Changing Environment Map are also able to download the imagery or view the sites in Google Earth.

The Fantastic Contraption may be my favorite game- An interactive opportunity to "build" working machines. It is addicting and would be GREAT on a SMARTBoard.