Resources and Events

Journal of Visualized Experiments: Laboratory procedures video archive

May 16, 2013

Just joined your advisor’s lab and don’t want to admit you don’t know how to use a fume hood?   Teaching a laboratory class, and want to provide a resource for your students?  Or are you needing to replicate another researcher’s protocol for removing mice mammaries?  The Journal of Visualized Experiments (JOVE) is a very [...]

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Materials available: Active learning materials & #clicker workshops in sciences

January 13, 2013

Welcome to the new semester!  I am spreading the word about an extensive set of materials for research-based transformed courses in the sciences here at the University of Colorado at Boulder.  All materials are available to the public on a creative commons license. Please share widely (other bloggers and tweeps, help me out!) These materials [...]

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How to teach Learning Assistants (or TAs) about teaching?

January 4, 2013

Many institutions are struggling on their own to provide good instructional materials to new teachers under their mentorship — namely graduate teaching assistants or undergraduate learning assistants.  These students are typically trying out teaching for the first time, and need opportunities to engage in discussion about the complex decision-making processes that they will face in [...]

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Let’s Talk (or sing) about Space

November 26, 2012

If you want a pleasant diversion from your day, check out this sweet song and music video from the Let’s Talk About Space project.  It’s a sweet, kind of They-Might-Be-Giantsy song and music video about space dreams… Let’s Talk About Space is a UK based project to promote interest in science and astronomy through music.  [...]

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Keep PhET free — help out by taking the survey

November 14, 2012

Anyone who uses PhET (or who knows about PhET but doesn’t use it — please take the following survey and forward on to your colleagues!  This data is really important to help them secure future funding (keeping it free, forever!) ———- Dear Fellow Educators, Administrators, Education Resource Providers, The PhET Interactive Simulations project (http://phet.colorado.edu) needs [...]

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New PhET Fractions simulation!

October 23, 2012

I wanted to share the news about one of the newest simulations from the PhET simulations team — Fractions and a stripped-down introductory version of the simulation (Fractions Matcher). http://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/fraction-matcher http://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulation/fractions-intro   I’ve been working a little with the PhET team of late, to make some video resources for teachers using the simulations, so I’ve [...]

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Vote for sciencegeekgirl: Fascinating science teacher blog of 2012

August 13, 2012

Got a moment?  Go ahead and vote for sciencegeekgirl as the most “Fascinating science teacher blog of 2012″.  Voting begins today, and ends August 20th. It’s a random little contest run by Accelerated Degree, but it would be nice to get some good lovin’ votes, so thanks!

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This is what a scientist looks like

April 3, 2012

I just found out about a pretty neat new Tumblr project, posting pictures of “real scientists”, to paint the picture of the diversity that is the lab-coated set.  It’s really fun to look through:  This is what a scientist looks like. I just submitted my photo, not sure how long it takes for them to [...]

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Interactive “scale of the universe” visualization

March 28, 2012

A friend just forwarded me this very neat visualization on the web:  The Scale of the Universe 2.  Just to give you a taste, here’s a screenshot.  But you should really go in and fiddle around. It’s quite fun.  The only negative point that I’ve got is that once you’ve zoomed in, there’s no way [...]

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Peer Instruction Network: A way to connect to #clicker users

February 26, 2012

Peer instruction is a technique of asking students to discuss a question with their neighbors, voting, and then holding a whole class discussion of the answers.  Visit the Physics Education Research User’s Guide here to see more about Peer Instruction. A lot of research has shown that users of peer instruction often don’t use it [...]

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15 fascinating TED talks for physics students

February 9, 2012

I don’t post many of these “best of” lists anymore, though they’re popular, because I’m not sure about sending traffic to these online university sites.  However, this one really caught my eye, and is a nice compilation of physics-related TED talks with short synopses: 15 fascinating TED talks for physics students. It’s got luminaries like [...]

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A great visual resource on learning goals

January 30, 2012

I wish I could embed this visual tool here so that you’d see how awesome it is and jump up and down in your seat like I did when I first saw it (at least, if you’re an edu-geek like me). But no, I can only provide you with a link and say go here. [...]

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Phylm: Make a film about physics!

January 8, 2012

Phylm /’film/ n. [physics + film] The fifth annual Phylm Prize is now open! Until May 13, anyone can enter a film — though students are especially encouraged — about physics. Year three’s winners were a set of students with the Special Relativity Rap. The second year was Science Made Fun about black holes (which [...]

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Handouts for January 4th Webinar: Make Clickers Work for You

January 4, 2012

I’m giving a webinar today to what is shaping up to be a huge group (over 400 registrants, a record for me!)  This is my introduction to clickers and peer instruction talk, “Make Clickers Work for You“.  I also do workshops on writing clicker questions and effective facilitation techniques, but this webinar is my quick [...]

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Free webinar on effective use of clickers

December 26, 2011

I’m giving another free webinar that I’m giving on effective use of clickers in the college classroom (though most is applicable to K12).  This webinar is an introductory look at best practices in clicker use, based on research, including peer instruction.  Please share this widely — these webinars have been very popular.  Make Clickers Work [...]

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A summary of the research on how to study

December 19, 2011

To follow up on the last post on the videos pitched to students on how to study, I want to direct your attention to a wonderful resource I just found out about: Organizing Instruction and Study to Improve Student Learning. It was published by IES, the Institute for Educational Sciences, which is the scientific arm [...]

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Learn about research-based teaching: The PER User’s Guide

December 8, 2011

There are a ton of research-based techniques for teaching, and we hear about them in bits and pieces.  There are great websites on modeling, for example, or our CU-Boulder  materials for using clickers and peer instruction.  But where can we go to find everything all in one place? I’m pleased to help spread the word [...]

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The Flipped Classroom: Using class time for learning, not presentation

December 5, 2011

I write a lot about teachniques (just coined that phrase, how do you like it?) to get students more interactive and engaged in your courses.  But a lot of teachers aren’t sure how to take the time to do those activities given how much content there is to cover.  As you might be aware, one [...]

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Where can I get good clicker questions?

November 7, 2011

I give a lot of workshops on the use of clickers and peer instruction to improve student engagement and deep learning.  I just found out about one more useful place to get good question items. Quick background information — I promote the use of clickers to help facilitate getting students to discuss and argue through [...]

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Learning Assistant Liveblogging: Pedagogy course

November 3, 2011

Once again, liveblogging from the national Learning Assistant Workshop in Boulder. When we started out the conference this afternoon, and participants shared their primary area of interest in learning more about effectively running an LA program, I’d say about half of the crowd Steve Iona talked to us about what that pedagogy course entails, and [...]

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