Thursday, July 26, 2012

IXL - Maths for the Left and Right Brain

I stumbled across this paid site similar is membership to Mathletics but there is no competition with this, just lots of practice...

IXL

It does seem like a reasonable value option, with quite a bit of free resources to try out on your interactive whiteboard. By getting membership students can be tracked against the national curriculum targets and earn rewards. The reporting looks very comprehensive.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Scale of the universe

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120312.html

Sorry I've copy and pasted as it from the website at it explains this really well. This is a great interactive resource.


What does the universe look like on small scales? On large scales? Humanity is discovering that the universe is a very different place on every proportion that has been explored. For example, so far as we know, every tiny proton is exactly the same, but every huge galaxy is different. On more familiar scales, a small glass table top to a human is a vast plane of strange smoothness to a dust mite -- possibly speckled with cell boulders. Not all scale lengths are well explored -- what happens to the smallest mist droplets you sneeze, for example, is a topic of active research -- and possibly useful to know to help stop the spread of disease. The above interactive flash animation, a modern version of the classic video Powers of Ten, is a new window to many of the known scales of our universe. By moving the scroll bar across the bottom, you can explore a diversity of sizes, while clicking on different items will bring up descriptive information.

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

CONASTA - Canberra 2012

Once again I'm heading over to CONASTA- (Australian Science Teachers Association). This year I will be facilitating two workshops "1:1 Computers in the Science Classroom" and "Free science Software and How to Use it in the Classroom" (workshop sessions A and C).

CONASTA is being held in Canberra this year so it will be cold

As always I will be drawing on my archive of blog entries to find those gems of applications and websites that make teaching with technology fun and engaging.

If you can think of a website, program or app that you think would be great to showcase please leave a comment below. Particularly if it is not on my blog at the moment.

My colleagues will also be presenting - Peter Niass is also doing 2 sessions on Monday and Matthew Burley is presenting with Jeff Stanger at the final sessions on Wednesday.

If you are coming to CONASTA I will be at Stands 1 & 2 in the exhibition hall and floating around during sessions so please come and say hi.