Paul Herder

For our final episode, we talk with Wisconsin colleague Paul Herder.  As coach of the Marshfield High School National Ocean Sciences Bowl team, Paul has led the team to win the NOSB for four consecutive years.  Paul talks to us about the regional and final competitions, his recent retirement from teaching, and what he is now doing with his life.

Links:

• Marshfield High School wins 15th annual National Ocean Sciences Bowl
• National Ocean Sciences Bowl
• Lake Sturgeon Bowl
• Marshfield, WI
• Aquila Resources
• What If Scientific – Leave Only Bubbles
• Vernier LabQuest2 Unbox Video
• Vernier’s Graphical Analysis for the iPad 

Wisconsin’s Lake Sturgeon Bowl:

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

David Vernier

Our guest this week is the co-founder of Vernier Software & Technology, David Vernier.  David talks to us about the history of the company, his popular software and data collection hardware, and the release of two new products that are part of Vernier’s Connected Science System – the LabQuest2 and Graphical Analysis iOS app.

Links:

• Vernier Software & Technology
• About Vernier Software & Technology
• Connected Science System
• LabQuest2
• Graphical Analysis for iPad
• LabQuest2: The new iPad is not the only new “tablet” on the block (NSTA Blog)

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Rachel Connolly

In anticipation of NOVA’s upcoming “Hunting the Elements” special and app, we got in touch with Rachel Connolly – NOVA’s Director of Education.  Rachel talks to us about the show and its accompanying app, NOVA’s Hunting the Elements periodic tweets, and other resources from NOVA.  Listen to the show and watch “Hunting the Elements”, airing 4/4/12 on PBS.

Links:

• Hunting the Elements
• NOVA’s Hunting the Elements periodic tweets
• NEW! Download the NOVA ELEMENTS app for iPad
• Hunting the Elements Facebook page
• Name that Element!
• NOVA
• WGBH Teacher’s Domain
• PBS Learning Media
• NOVA Science Now
• Rachel Connolly, NOVA
• davidpogue.com

Watch Hunting the Elements Promo on PBS. See more from NOVA.

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Zoran Popović

Our guest this week is Zoran Popović.  As director for the Center for Game Science at the University of Washington, Zoran helped create (with David Baker and Seth Cooper) Foldit – a popular online game that teaches protein folding and ultimately allows scientists to discover protein structures through crowdsourcing and community collaboration.  Zoran talks to us about Foldit and using games to help solve problems facing humanity.

Links:

• Zoran Popović, University of Washington
• fold.it
• UW Center for Game Science
• “Gamers Unravel the Secret Life of Proteins” (Wired.com)
• “Foldit Gamers Solve Riddle of HIV Enzyme Within 3 Weeks” (Scientific American)
• Educurious
• “Physics of the Yellow Angry Bird“, by Rhett Allain (Wired.com)
• Dreambox
• Refraction

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Fred Ende

Our guest this week is Fred Ende.  As a middle-school science teacher, Fred quickly became frustrated with cookie-cutter, partial inquiry and simple scientific method lab reports that rarely engaged students in the content.  Deciding to change this mode, Fred created open-ended lab experiences where students investigated their own questions, became interested in sharing their work, and ultimately improved their scientific writing.  Fred talks to Lab Out Loud about his experience in making scientific writing more relevant and student-centered.

Links:

• Download the article (provided courtesy of NSTA): “Not Another Lab Report“, by Fred Ende in NSTA’s Science Scope)
• Fred’s Blog
• Follow Fred on Twitter
• SCIENCE 21
• Follow SCIENCE 21 on Twitter
• “A Framework for K-12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and Core Ideas” (from the National Academies Press)

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Just like the Newton doodle, this logo screams for analysis.

Finding the frequency of the Google doodle in Logger Pro

It turns out that the doodle is a simply animated gif. Since gif files can be opened in Quicktime, I used the video analysis in Vernier’s Logger Pro to get the time for the doodle’s first trough (the first “o” in Google) to pass. This value is 0.8 seconds. That makes 1.6 seconds for a complete period and 1/1.6 seconds gives us a frequency of 0.62 Hertz. If this letter was traveling at the speed of light, it would have a wavelength that is 483536 kilometers long.

Using  the photo analysis in Logger Pro, I found the wavelenghs for the other letters of the doodle by scaling the photo with the wavelength calculated for the first “o” in the doodle.

Here are my results:

Google Wavy Doodle Results

This week we talk with Jon Dudas, president of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology).  Dudas talks to Lab Out Loud about their upcomingrobotics competitions, how they teach kids how to try, fail and succeed, and how hands-on robotic lessons can enhance the classroom experience and spark interest in science education and careers.

Links:

• FIRST
• FIRST Robotics Competition
• About Jon Dudas
• i.am FIRST – Science is Rock and Roll
• Lego Mindstorms
• LEGO Mindstorms Education NXT

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Dr. Steven Schlozman

This week we talk with Dr. Steven Schlozman, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and Lecturer in Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.  Schlozman talks to us about his start in teaching, his recent book “The Zombie Autopsies: Secret Notebooks from the Apocalypse” and how to use zombies to teach science.

Links:

• The Zombie Autopsies
• “The Zombie Autopsies” (Amazon.com)
• Steven Schlozman Profile at Harvard
• George Romero Continues Undead Obsession with ‘Zombie Autopsies’
• Potential of a Zombie Attack Considered by Guest Speaker (the Utah Statesman)
• A Harvard Psychiatrist Explains Zombie Neurobiology
• Inside Zombie Brains: Sci-fi Teaches Science (CNN)
• The Neuropsychology of Zombies (Boston.com)
• Essential Zombie Films
• The Walking Dead, AFC

More Links:

• Zombiecows.com
• “Drunken Bird Day” - Cedar Waxwings
• Science and Entertainment Exchange
• Cocktail Physics
• Episode 28: Who Watches the Watchmen
• Episode 40: Being Sean Carroll
• Firefly (no sound in space)

The Zombie Autopsies Book Trailer

Zombie Autopsies 101 from Daniel Lagin on Vimeo.

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.

Dr. Eugenie Scott

As science educators are increasingly reporting attacks on climate change education, the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) is announcing that they will also be defending climate change science in public school science education.  Join us as Dr. Eugenie Scott explains this new initiative for NCSE by adding climate change to their portfolio in defending good science education.

Links:

• National Center for Science Education
• “US Teachers Offered Support for Climate Change Lessons” (the Guardian)
• Episode 15 – Expelled Exposed
• NCSE: “A New Poll on Evolution and Climate Change”
• NCSE: “Teachers Feeling the Heat Over Climate Change”
• Dr. Eugenie Scott Interview with “Flock of Dodos” filmmaker Randy Olson, October 2010 (YouTube)
• “Plate Tectonics is a Hoax!”

To listen to this episode, download the mp3 directly, find us on iTunes, or use the player below.