Instructify

Some people discourage you, telling you not to “reinvent the wheel.” Other people will give you too much encouragement, saying “build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.” Do not listen to either of these people. Both are trying to distract you with nonsensical feedback while they secretly steal your inventions and race to the patent office. While its clear that I have an obvious mistrust for others concerning my inventions (potato chip clip AND TV remote combined), don’t let my negativity infect your science classroom.

Originally published few years back, this article by the BMJ (formerly the British Medical Journal) takes a rigorous look at one invention that is assumed to work just fine the way it exists: the parachute. Apparently, we’ve assumed parachutes to be a successful way of preventing death by “gravitational challenge” based purely on anecdotal evidence — there hasn’t been a single study that included controlled, randomized, double-blind parachute placebo groups. Without such a study, can we really know for sure that skydivers wouldn’t fare as well with a placebo instead of a parachute?

Their intent was to satirize criticisms about health interventions based off observational data by advocates who prefer evidence based findings. You, however, can use it with your students to spark an interest in challenging assumptions and looking at things from a different angle. While the article is tongue-in-cheek, it works on a fundamental level in that it is still an interesting, solid example for students trying to write a scientific research paper to see just how a scientific research paper gets written. Abstract, objective, data sources, citations—they are all in there. -NICK YINGLING

Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma related to gravitational challenge: systematic review of randomised controlled trials via BMJ

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Photo credit: Library of Congress

I just ate the sticker off my granny smith apple.  Well, to be more precise, I just ate about 3/4 of the sticker, and when I was taking the next bite, I saw the remaining bit.  So I didn’t eat the whole sticker.  But now I am left wondering which is more toxic — the pesticides no doubt used to make sure this delicious apple grew to be ginormous, or the sticker and its adhesive?  I mean, they have to consider that one in 10 dummies will end up eating the sticker, right?

Michael Pollan wrote a tremendous pieces for the NYT Magazine this weekend: An Open Letter to Our Next Farmer-in-Chief.  In it, he argues that the American food system is deeply broken, and with the price of oil rising, in need of reform. Soon.

It must be recognized that the current food system — characterized by monocultures of corn and soy in the field and cheap calories of fat, sugar and feedlot meat on the table — is not simply the product of the free market. Rather, it is the product of a specific set of government policies that sponsored a shift from solar (and human) energy on the farm to fossil-fuel energy.

The piece lays out an agenda that includes not just reform of the government’s approach to agriculture (which should delight free-marketeers), but a prescription for better health (cutting back on plentiful corn and soy could mean limitations on cheap non-food derivatives like high fructose corn syrup) and some re-tooling of the educational system as well (taking a long hard look at agricultural/industrial education and how we promote certain careers).  This is the kind of thoughtful editorial that could spark some real discussion in a classroom — you could use it as-is for high-schoolers or adapt it for middle-schoolers. -ROSS WHITE

An Open Letter to Our Next Farmer-in-Chief

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Photo credit: Stevie Rocco on flickr

If you were jonesing for a list of lists to better your edification skills yesterday, I apologize. Nonetheless, Instructify is happy to present Tuesday by the Numbers, the day-late version of its sister column, Monday by the Numbers.

100 Free Online Ivy League Courses You Should Take Just for Fun - I know it says “for fun,” but come on, the real reason to take any class is to get some sort of betterment or education, right? Whatever your motive, Eduk8 delivers this great list of online course offerings from places like Johns Hopkins and MIT. The courses themselves range in subject from Child Development and Psychology to Foreign Culture, and the list is chock full of such unique offerings as The Anthropology of Computing and Hip Hop.

100 Awesome, Free Web Tools for Elementary Teachers - It can be tough sometimes to filter out the things on the web that are truly valuable, especially when it comes to things that are useful in teaching children. Here’s a list from SmartTeaching.org that will help you be a better researcher and educator to the youngins. With 100 here, you’ll find something you didn’t know for sure.

101 Ideas for a Great Start - Though the school year has technically already begun, it isn’t too late to start things out right by setting yourself and your students up for success. Iowa State offers these tips in establishing some great methods for students and teachers to start things off on the right foot. The list is set up in categories such as ‘creating a welcoming atmosphere’ and ‘encourage active learning.’

7 tips to top sleep, 3 tips for staying awake - Though it should just be as easy as ‘get to bed earlier, wake up later,’ sleeping is not always as easy a task as it seems to accomplish. The University Blog gives us these tips to help you zonk out at night, and pep up during the day. Stop yawning and read these now. -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Photo credit:  zen on flickr

In recent years, a lot of schools have told their physical education programs to hit the showers. Greater emphasis on testing, budget cuts, and so on. But as school wallets get lighter, the children are getting heavier due to lack of exercise.

If you’re concerned about your students’ health, you can do something about it by extolling the virtues of healthy exercise. Ask Little Johnny how his little league team did over the summer. Do you have any joggers or climbers in your midst? Take an interest, and maybe they’ll get more active.

Of course, the best way to generate excitement about exercise is to let students see you do it yourself. If you’re a runner, show up early and run at the track before class starts. Maybe volunteer as a coach.

Personally, I’m a walker. I’m not going to pretend it’s a huge workout, but almost any activity is better exercise than sitting. If you live close enough, consider walking to school. If you live in a small community, or you have errands within walking distance, try taking a walk down your town’s main street. You’ll be visibly modeling good behavior, and parents will like the fact you’re out and about within the community. You can check out Walk Score to help gauge how walkable your area is, as well as to look for ideas for neat business or attractions you can find within walking distance.

Teaching kids healthy habits should be a goal of every school. Even if yours doesn’t have a dedicated health or P.E program, you can still teach them a lot about healthful living. -BILL FERRIS

Walk Score

Obesity Up, Phys Ed Down

Photo credit: Thomas Hawk on flickr

Five Rules for Better PowerPoint Presentations -Michael Hyatt’s blog, Working Smart, has these 5 great tips to spice up your next PowerPoint. The article is written from a business perspective, but that doesn’t mean these tips won’t help you when teaching the Civil War or Beowulf. One of the more important tidbits of advice is #4: Less is More. Amen, Mr. Hyatt.

40 Places for College Students to Find Free Unabridged Books Online -Your students, whether they are going to college or not, can surely benefit from more reading. In a digital age, why waste all the paper it takes to reprint a book when they are often archived online. These resources are, of course, free and include a list of places you can download audio versions of your favorite classics. Thanks to Education-Portal.com

Eleven Worst Foods Americans Eat Daily - It might be high time to get back on a health kick for your author, and what better place to start than identifying and limiting or eliminating certain foods from my diet. You can get on the train with me, and start the school year off right. HealthAssist.net presents this list of 11 kinds of food you should think twice before eating. Unfortunately for you, me and the good people at Krispy Kreme, doughnuts lead the list. Bummer, Bear Claw.

(25) Funny Metaphors Used in High School Essays -Because we aren’t without a sense of humor around here, (hopefully, you have one, too) so here are Help.com’s 25 examples of ridiculous metaphors used by high school students in various essays. Please note: some of these might be considered similes.  Among my favorite: From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30 and He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something. - JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

12 Superfoods You Need to be Eating - If there’s anyone who loves to eat, it’s me. Unfortunately, I don’t always pay too much attention to what I am putting in my body. Lucky for me, and everyone else out there who trying to get beach ready, StartCooking.com offers this list of some of the foods you might already be eating, and some that you should start. Thankfully on the list: peanut butter. Nom.

60 Selected Best Famous Quotes - “You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take.”—Wayne Gretzky. For this and other gems of wisdom, point your browser over to Litemind to discover some highly thought provoking quotes just in time for dinner party season. Or, I guess you can dole some out in your classroom to help you students realize how well-read you are. I’m thinking this is where I’ll go when I need something to open my first novel.

100 Must-Read Books: The Essential Man’s Library - I never thought I would include a blog called The Art of Manliness on a education blog, but here I am. This list isn’t exclusively for men, of course, but it does offer some great reads for those of us who don’t fancy Little Women. Maybe this list can inspire some of your guy students to want to read this summer. Not surprisingly included on the list, A Catcher in the Rye.

15 Ways to Teach Kids About Money - Most of us are pinching pennies right now, but that doesn’t mean our youngsters know what the words “recession,” “inflation,” or “insufficient funds” mean. Right now might be the best time to teach them though, according to this list from Family Education:

Help children learn the differences between needs, wants, and wishes. This will prepare them for making good spending decisions in the future.

Those are words we can probably all benefit from. - JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Get Smarter: 12 Hacks That Will Amp Up Your Brainpower
Exercise your mind with these 12 strategies from Wired designed to max out your brainpower. Tips include exercising wisely, putting the right kinds of information in your brain, and even finding out the optimum dosages of caffeine.

40 Ways to Spice Up Your Spelling Words
Who doesn’t love memorizing spelling words? Your students, probably. Plenty of adults have trouble with spelling, meaning it’s probably even tougher for kids. Help them out by making your spelling words more interesting with these ideas.

50 Handy Tricks
File this under “Grab Bag.” Instructables presents this list of 50 Handy Tricks encompassing nothing in particular. You’ll learn how to do everything from taking blink-free photos to making a bow-and-arrow out of skis. Not necessarily teaching-related, but a creative soul like you can certainly figure out a way to build a lesson plan around reupholstering your couch with duct tape, can’t you?

10 virtually instant ways to improve your life
Want to add some quality to your quality of life? The folks at Stepcase Lifehack have some ideas, most of which can be summarized by the word, “relax.” Avoiding drama, not being a perfectionist, and not taking things personally will all help you make a fitter, happier and more productive life for yourself. -BILL FERRIS

Photo credit: Kaptain Kobold on flickr

8 Firefox Extensions Towards Safer Browsing - Personally, I HATE pop-up ads, (and most banner ads) so I do whatever I can to avoid them. Firefox already does a nice job of keeping pop-ups from occurring, but there is a lot of things that slip by Firefox by itself. Luckily, ts/sci Security (a nice, clean, ad-free blog) presents this list of some helpful add-ons that can help give you some peace-of-mind when it comes to web browsing.

30 Tips to Rejuvenate Your Creativity - Lifehack does it again with this list of 30 ways to chop your creative block right in twain. As it turns out “start somewhere” isn’t really as hard as you might think. Also one of my favorites, “Don’t judge your ideas until you have plenty to judge.”

10 Extraordinarily Different Uses for Potatoes - Sorry folks, those delicious tubers aren’t just for mashing and au gratin-ing anymore. Gomestic offers this list of some unorthodox ways of using potatoes other than just eating them. I don’t know if any of the tips could be qualified as being “extraordinarily different” per-se, but they sure are neat. Surprisingly not on the list: make a battery.

100 Most Often Mispronounced Words and Phrases in English - I’m expecially critical when it comes to people misusing grammar. Whether I’m enjoying an expresso or just reading in the libary, there is always an abundance of people mispronouncing words, mispellling them, excetera. Here’s a list from YourDictionary.com of words people all-too-often mispronounce. I’d love to see a list of phrases people misuse in context, but that would be a whole nother post.

When Wikipedia Won’t Cut It: 25 Online Sources for Reliable, Researched Facts - I blogged about some other alternative-to-Wikipedia resources not too long ago, but here are some more. Students are going to use the internet to do their research, so they might as well have an abundance of reliable places to find information, right? Check out this list of 25 from CollegeDegree.com. -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

(photo credit: jaycoxfilm on Flickr.)

I never read The DaVinci Code or saw the movie version, but I have a pretty good indication of what it’s all about. If you are a fan of either, then you’ll probably enjoy this Flash cartoon parody that employs talking animals in the roles of their human counterparts.

The BioDaVersity Code is a fun, educational cartoon presented by Harvard Medical School’s Center for Health and Global Environment. It uses the structure and basic storyline of The DaVinci Code to explore and explain the effects of the human impact on “The Web of Life.” The animation is wonderful, and the information is presented in such a way that allows any age of student to grasp it, all the while being thoroughly entertained. The film feels unfinished, though, as there is no plot resolution, only a call to viewers to take action into their own hands.

This is easily done with the click on a button titled “Learn More”– taking users to a Flash activity which lets them explore what may be done to alter human impact on the “web of life.” The cartoon itself was produced by Free Range Studios, who also have created such fun and educational films as The Meatrix, and Grocery Store Wars. Those and others can be found here. -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

The BioDaVersity Code 

From the comfort of our living rooms, we can build make-believe cities, play lead guitar in a rock and roll band, and dance like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. As computer games continue to dominate our students’ leisure time, educators are asking how to incorporate this popular technology in the classroom.

As educators, one hurdle we face is how to keep students’ attention while teaching important lessons. Now, thanks to the folks at the United Nations World Food Programme, we have an opportunity to enlighten students to the problems and concerns of world hunger by integrating the fun of computer games into a learning environment.

Food Force is a downloadable computer action game aimed at 8-13 year olds. The game consists of six missions that allow students to see and make a situational assessment of a hunger crisis in a fictional country. Each subsequent mission builds on skills learned and allows students to make valuable decisions about food distribution and logistics. And teachers, don’t miss the links page where you can find numerous sites providing research and background on the global hunger crisis.

Given the persistent problem of world hunger, Food Force is an entertaining way to teach younger students of this treatable epidemic. With this exciting and inventive site, we have the chance to allow students to turn virtual problems into real solutions that can alter our reality for the better. —DAVID BARGER

Food Force

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BBC presents the Science Interactive Body - a great learning device for students studying the human body and its systems. Not quite as creepy as the Bodies exhibit, this game tests users in correctly identifying and placing the pieces of the human body in the right places. Choose from Organs, Muscles, Skeleton or Nervous System, and then pick your favorite gender. A wire frame dummy acts as your Frankenstein’s monster as you rotate and drag and drop organs, tissues, and bones into their respective places. The game is a stickler for accuracy, though, and if your rotation or placement is slightly off, it won’t let you proceed until you get it right.

There are a slew of facts to accompany each organ or system, as well as hints to guide your placement. If your students are squeamish about seeing or interacting with actual guts, or if your school is too cheap to shell out for some real cadavers, then check out this interactive game to keep you informed. -JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

BBC Science - Interactive Body

Top Ten Obscure Google Search Tricks - Lifehacker provides us with this list of 10 ways you didn’t know you could use Google just in time for the new year (Has it been 2008 for a week ALREADY?). Included in this list are useful, and definitely obscure tips like “Get the local time anywhere” and “ID people, objects and foreign language words and phrases with image search.”

10 Ways to Make Your iPod a Better Learning Gadget - If you haven’t already broken it, use that new iPod you got from Santa for something other than listening to Kanye 24/7. Openculture presents this list to help you remember that gadgets can be used for something other than just a distraction or entertainment. My favorites on the list: “Create eBooks,” and “Put Wikipedia on your iPod.”

Cool Ways to Use Your Digital Camera or Camera Phone - For those of use who didn’t find an iPod under the tree this year, but a digital camera instead, 1 Heck of a Guy brings us this list of ways to use your new point n’ shoot to your advantage. Think outside the frame and use your 7.1 megapixels for something useful like creating an electronic whiteboard or take pictures of landmarks to help you get where you’re going. Or better yet, get back to where you’ve been (i.e. where you parked).

15 Ways to Restart the Exercise Habit (And How to Keep It) - Lifehack unfailingly brings us a list to help us improve our lives, and this time, they are promoting something most of us can benefit from in order to extend the life we are trying so diligently to make more productive. This list provides tips to help you get your big butt in the gym, and how to keep it there. So if you’re as unsatisfied with the ways the holidays have treated your midsection as I am, then you’ll surely jump on this list with gusto. - JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

(photo by Triotex )

Better late than never, right folks? Sorry for the late post, but I had too much eggnog this weekend… Anywho, onward to the numbers!

2000 Uses for WD-40 - I know it isn’t necessarily a teaching tool, but chances are likely that you can find something useful here. This list goes from the very useful (Removes water spots from mirrors, Cleans silver jewelry) to the completely banal and borderline absurd (Removes rollerblade marks from kitchen floor [?]). I’m sure you’ll find some new way to use WD-40 here, even though 1000 of the uses include “Lubricate.”

25 Ways to Fit in 10 Minutes of Exercise - RevolutionHealth brings us this list right in time for planning those New Year’s resolutions. We are all undeniably busy, but who can get anything done if they don’t feel good in the first place? Follow the ideas on this list and you will no longer be able to use the excuse “I don’t have the time” when it comes to exercising.

The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun - This simple flash film reinforces a great idea, and one that we may or may not take for granted. Fun can mean much more than just watching a sitcom on TV, in fact, it’s really much more than that. This list of eight mantras to help boost your fun-level includes things like “Get Focused - Start Being Intensely Selfish”. Visit the site, click on a number, and enjoy.

11 Websites Every Student Should Know - Thanks to TechDo.com, students have this comprehensive list of the first places to turn when it comes to looking for help on the web. There are some real gems here, and Wikipedia doesn’t even look anywhere near the finish line. Some notables: Math.com, NovelGuide.com, and one our favorites- HowStuffWorks.

-JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

(photo credit: L. Marie)

If you need a daily jolt of caffeine and aren’t a coffee person, you might want to read this alarming article about what soda can do to you.

Wade Meredith of Healthbolt writes that caffeinated sodas, those effervescent energy-boosters, do quite a number on your body, to say nothing about the damage all that sugar can do to your teeth. He provides a timeline of the sugary assault on your system in his article, “What Happens To Your Body If You Drink A Coke Right Now?” However, as a devoted Coke drinker, I must point out that these findings apply to any sugar-based soda, so don’t think you’re exempt because you drink Pepsi.

He writes,

In The First 10 minutes: 10 teaspoons of sugar hit your system. (100% of your recommended daily intake.) You don’t immediately vomit from the overwhelming sweetness because phosphoric acid cuts the flavor allowing you to keep it down.

20 minutes: Your blood sugar spikes, causing an insulin burst. Your liver responds to this by turning any sugar it can get its hands on into fat. (There’s plenty of that at this particular moment)

It’s worth noting here that Mr. Meredith is not a doctor. Also, he obviously hasn’t used EasyBib to cite his sources - his research is vague at best. That said, it’s not like you thought soda was good for you.

Reading this article makes me glad I switched to Coke Zero - I still get my caffeine buzz, but without all the sugar. But if you find info about the hazards of diet sodas, please keep it to yourself. I don’t want to know. –BILL FERRIS

Healthbolt

Personally, I love games. I like them more when they are challenging, insightful and educational. Edheads is the kind of site that I can really get behind. With an array of fun, flash based games to improve science and reasoning skills, this site is way above its competition. The animation and style of the page itself is sleek and approachable for many age groups, but seems to be steered towards web savvy kids and fun-loving adults. With titles like “Virtual Hip Replacement” and “Crash Scene Investigation,” how could you go wrong?

There are less than a dozen games here, but they all involve a little more time than simply shooting blips with a mouse or fudging a right answer. Players go through a series of events to score points and ultimately complete a task. The animation is cheeky and sometimes silly, but the lessons are always very real and allow players to visualize their answers at work. Each game also has a teacher’s guide to help guide you through the lesson of each game, what the appropriate grade level is for each game, and how to help students figure out trouble spots. Try out these games for yourself, as the difficulty ranges from very simple to full on surgery. (The Virtual Knee Surgery game is not for the squeamish!) –JEREMY S. GRIFFIN

Edheads