Educational Links

Courses That I Teach

Duke Physics Challenges.

Public talks of general interest.

• Four lectures about Einstein and his achievements, in December 2005 and January 2006, at the Chapel Hill Public Library. The talks discussed his three great papers of 1905 on relativity, photons, and Brownian motion, and his 1916 general theory of relativity (a theory of gravity).

Astronomy:

• Astronomy Picture of the Day, lots of interesting patterns from planetary surfaces to galactic structure.
• Links from my Physics 55 introductory astronomy course.

• Amazing Space (Hubble Space Telescope Site)
• AstronomyCenter.org, database for people teaching introductory astronomy courses.
• Chandra X-ray telescope
• CLEA: Contemporary Laboratory Experiences in Astronomy.
• Messier catalog of astronomical objects.
• NASA:
  • NASA Photojournal
  • NASA TV (RealPlayer version).
• Shapley Visiting Lectureships in Astronomy, list of astronomers able to give interesting public talks.

Biology:

• Bio2010 report by Stryer et al, need to change physics, math, bio undergraduate curricula.
• Bioportal of North Carolina
• BioQuest, curriculum consortium to support educators interested in reforming undergraduate biology.
• Books (online):
  • Bookshelf of the National Center for Biological Information. Some books here can be completely displayed, others one can only read pages that match some search criterion.
  • Molecular Biology of the Cell, 4th edition, Alberts et al (searchable)
• Bugbytes: recorded sounds of many insects.
• The Computable Plant.
• Darwin (online works of Charles Darwin).
• EcoBeaker, ecology teaching software.
• Human Genome Project Working Draft.
• Rediscovering Biology: a professional development course for high school biology teachers (Annenberg Media).
• USA Biology Olympiad.

Blogs related to science

• Biocurious
• Cocktail Party Physics.
• Cosmic Variance.
• Inkycircus.
• The Panda's Thumb
• Pharyngula.
• RealClimate

Chemistry:

• Books of general interest:
  • The Radioactive Boyscout by Ken Silverstein.
  • Uncle Tungsten by Oliver Sacks.
• carolina.com chemistry projects.
• Nonlinear Chemical Dynamics Movies, John Pojman.
• Steven Haderlie's AP Chemistry Resource Page.
• UNC-Chapel Hill Chemistry Fundamentals Program.
• Periodic table of the elements, picture based, from Popular Science.

Companies:

• American 3B Scientific company: science equipment, demos.
• Arbor Scientific (educational devices)
• Blackboard: provider of online educational services.
• Carolina.com, supplier of equipment, chemicals, etc.
• Edmund Scientific
• Edudex: Videos and CD-ROMS for physics and chemistry education.
• Electronic Goldmine (high tech electronics and components).
• Elenco Eletronics, Inc.,, electronic kits for hobbyists and students.
• Films for the Humanities & Sciences
• Fisher Science Education Catalog.
• Klinger Educational Physics Experiments.
• Shodor Education Foundation, based in Durham, NC.
• Teacher's Video Company
• WebCT: web-based course tools.

Computer Science:

• Chinook, invincible checkers-playing program that one can play online.
• Computational Science Education Project (CSEP).
• MSW Logo.
• Online books:
  • Common Lisp: A Gentle Introduction to Symbolic Computation, free online book by David Touretzky.
  • How C Programming Works, part of the howstuffworks webpage.
  • Thinking in C++, 2e by Bruce Eckel.
• USA Computing Olympiad (USACO).

Demos and Projects:

• Chemistry demos.
• St. Olaf list of projects for middle school children (mainly physics).

Environmental Science:

• ClimateChoices.org
• The Discovery of Global Warming.
• Encyclopedia of Earth.
• RealClimate: climate science from climate scientists.

Linguistics

• Ethnologue, Languages of the World.

Organizations:

• American Association of Physics Teachers
• MentorNet for diversity in engineering and science.
• National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, with a link to the Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics.
• National Educational Association.
• National Science Board.
• NC Project SEED, A Science Educational Experience for High School Students.
• NC State K-12 Directory
• NC State Physics Education effort.
• Public School Forum of North Carolina
• U. S. Department of Education.
• Wright Center for Science Education at Tufts.

People:

• Peoplesarchive.com, video interviews of many prominents scientists (unfortunately a commercial site).
• Don Herbert, Mr. Wizard.
• Robert J. Beichner , NC State. SCALE-UP project.
• Robert Krampf, Science Education Co. Many interesting friendly videos about science.

Physics

Reports:

• AAPT National Tast Force on Undergraduate Physics (SPIN-UP). January, 2003.
• Bio2010 report by Stryer et al, need to change physics, math, bio undergraduate curricula.
• Kirby/Gollub Report on undergraduate physics education.
• Learning and Understanding: Improving Advanced Study of Mathematics and Science in U.S. High Schools, with panel reports on physics and other specific areas (biology, chemistry, and math).
• Science and Engineering Indicators (NSF Report).

Statistics:

• Freeware statistical programs.
• The R Project for Statistical Computing.
  • ESS: Emacs Speaks Statistics, to run R under emacs.

Wikis related to education:

• Curriki, global education and learning community.
• Wikipedia.