Recent NSTA book reviews.

Just want to include these reviews and catch up!
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Apologia Physics: Horse power lab

Rob's been working from the Apologia textbook on problems for Chapters 7, 8, and 9.  I've been ill for the past two months.  Ugh.  I do have another lab--this horse power lab.  For this lab, you'll need to weigh yourself, measure each riser in a stair case and count the number of stairs in the stair case you use.   Now get someone to time you climbing the stairs as quickly as possible.  Repeat a minimum of three times.  Fun, right?

Apologia Physics: Friction Lab with Formal Lab Report

Today, the guys did a Friction Lab in order to calculate the coefficient of Friction.  Mainly I wanted to have another lab and make the guys write a formal lab report. This is a great lab.  You need a ramp and a block.  We brought wooden ramps, cardboard, a vinyl binder, and a tile plank.  Then, we made available parchment paper, wax paper, sandpaper, and aluminum foil available.  I brought out density cubes and a wooden block.  The guys had to both design and implement their experiment.  Rob had them do the calculations both ways described in the experiment.  The lab report is written is the third person, present tense, indicative mood, and active voice.  (Ex.  The first step is to set up the ramp and block.)  The lab report should have a title, Coefficient of Friction Lab, purpose, To understand friction, background, an explanation of the coefficient of friction, a hypothesis, the copper block has more friction than aluminum block, materials, scale, block, ramp, procedures, One places the block on the ramp, a data chart in Excel with the equations, the calculations, a photo, and a conclusion, The data either supports or refutes the hypothesis.  The lab report is typed and emailed.  When the guys finish, I'll post examples.

Materials

Here is a message from my husband, Rob.  We ran into a problem with Excel.
During class today we noticed that excel returned the wrong numbers when we used the sine and cosine functions with the degrees of the angle we measured during our friction coefficient lab.

The excel functions for sine and cosine use radians not degrees.  To correct for this you must convert degrees to radians.  Use =radian(degrees you measured) to convert degrees to radians.  Then =sin(radians calculated) to get the proper number to use in your calculations.  Check your answers with a graphing calculator or a sine/cosine chart.

We were validating our calculations by using both equations to calculate the friction coefficient.  We had a large margin of error.  Please recalculate the equations using the proper way of calculating sine and cosine.  Please show your calculations in excel.

Fling Science Physics

Look at this cute post.

Newton's First Law Demos

The Hidden Life of Toads NSTA Review

Doug Wechsler’s children’s book, The Hidden Like of a Toad is lovely. The author is a photographer and the graphics are compelling.   Toad describes the life cycle of toads.  Life cycles is an important concept in early elementary science.  Typically, kindergarten and first grade classrooms study butterflies.  But why not substitute toads?  Wechsler removed toad embryos from a nearby pond to study and photograph at home.  Teachers can take embryos from local ponds for classroom study, too.  The Hidden Like of a Toad is so detailed, the teacher can use this book for reference as the tadpoles develop.

Toad answers the questions curious children want to know.  What are the long ribbons of black eggs in ponds?  Embryos! (Day 1).  How do they breathe? Gills (Day 9) and lungs (Day 45).  What do they eat?  (Day 70) Wechsler did his homework; the book contains an updated taxonomy under Toad Facts, at the end of the book.  (The book is unnumbered.)  Toad answers a question I had.  How do toads survive the winter?  They burrow into the mud over the winter (Day 70).  The photos are clearly labeled, such as the vocal sac (Day 1097 opposite Brrrrrr!)  At the end of the book is a glossary and comparison between frogs and toads.  (What’s the difference between a frog and a toad?)  Additionally, at the back are Toad Facts, Saving Toads (Toad Detour), an explanation how Wechsler got the photos, and a resource page.  I read Toad to my favorite six year old, Paul, who is a big fiction fan.  Nonfiction?  Not so much.  He was engrossed, high praise from any child.  The Hidden Like of a Toad and its lavish photos is perfect for the early elementary classroom and any library.  My copy is promised to Paul’s school library.  

Apologia Physics: Excel Quiz and POGIL Intro to Newton's Laws of Motion

The first thing we did was test the guys' spreadsheet skills by entering their equations into Excel or Google Sheets.   It took forever!  Then we did an intro to Newton's Laws with POGIL, specifically this exercise with Newton's First Law , Second Law, and Third Law.  POGIL is slow--but effective.  I scanned answer sheets to use as keys.  Here are Newton's First Law and Newton's Second Law Pogil Answer Keys.  You need to use deductive reasoning.  I like POGIL as an introduction to a new concept.  POGIL was originally developed for Chemistry classes at colleges.  This approach works to both review material and hammer in the basics, in this case, Newton's Laws of Motion.  What I'm not finding are answer keys.  The Taskstream site from Ms. Knapps has a number of websites listed and is designed for Physical Science more than for Physics.

Here is a good Newton's Laws Labs Introduction and POGIL practice.

Update: The key for Newton's Third Law (above) is now available.  We wrote out the keys--there may be errors.  We crossed out a great deal of awkward wording.  Keys were difficult to locate because the authors want them away from students.

Apologia Physics: Excel or Google Sheets

Today in class we learned how to enter physics problems and formulas into either Excel or Google Sheets, which is the Google version of spreadsheets.  (Before we tackled Excel, we tried to troubleshoot Vernier's Physics app.  We need to put this on hold, for now.  In order to figure out the intervals between points captured of the missile's parabola, we need the angles and heights.  In other words, we'll come back to Vernier's app after Thanksgiving.). Back to Excel.  Rob used the tutorial above and entered all of the data, inserted the formulas, etc. first in Excel.  Next, he reentered all of the data into Google's sheets.  We had two laptops and a desktop.  We tried entering data and formulas online into Google sheets on an iPad.   Not. At. All. Easy.  The Google sheets are similar to Excel.  So, as long as we used the laptops or desktop, we only had to contend with inexperience with Excel.  It literallly took an hour to set up the data and enter the formulas together.  Here's why this exercise is useful.  As you're manipulating the data, you still need to understand the relationships among velocity and velocity y.  I'm going to try to use the Excel app for iPad to see if it's any better.
Update: The Excel app is a bit better and data can be successfully entered.  But, boy is it awful!

Apologia Physics with Vernier

Today we are trying Venier's Video Physics for iPad.  Our plan is to capture video of a catapult in slow motion, import the video into the app, export the data to Vernier's Logger Lite software, AND import this same data into a  Google spread sheet.  Completely uncharted territory.  The kids have no experience with spreadsheets, like Excel.  So, we're starting with Excel 101 only with Google sheets, beacause Google Docs are free.  Here are the videos we're using.

Apologia Physics: Vernier Physics App

Tomorrow, our plan is to go over some problems in projectile motion.  I bought an app for my iPad, Vernier's Physics.  Tomorrow, I plan to broadcast a youtube video explanation and let the boys see if we can figure out how to analyze motion with the app.  I plan to make a full disclosure of my ignorance.  We shall see.

Science Outreach Program for Elementary

My husband, Rob, and I are doing a program for a local elementary school.  The librarian wants to implement "Five Minute Science Stations".  This afternoon, Rob and I worked with a fifth grade class to test the program with catapults, hot wheels, and CD spinners.  The idea is for the fifth graders to test an idea and develop a video for their peers.  Other students can watch the video and replicate the experiment.  We used a launcher and track to teach speed.  It took a bit to convey the idea of speed and have the kids determine how to measure speed with Hot Wheels.  We did the same thing with craft stick catapults and CD spinners.

Hot Wheels took a bit of time.  Eventually, the kids were able to use an iPad as a timer and understood to take a least three measurements to average.  We even talked about the problem with reaction time and timing the speed, as well as converting feet per second into miles per hour.  With the catapults, we emphasized angle and distance.  As to the CD spinner, I showed the kids a few optical illusions and gave them CD patterns to color.  Here are the photos.