Category: Education

Hey to Blind Brook High School, Hickory High School, and Terrill Middle School

It’s Adopt-a-Physicist time again, and I’ve been “adopted” by three classes: Susan Kelly’s class at Blind Brook High School in Rye, NY; Lisa Edwards’s class at Hickory High School in Hickory, NC (insert your own Hoosiers joke); and Suprit Dharmi’s class at Terrill Middle School in Scotch Plains, NJ. So here’s a shout-out to all… Continue reading Hey to Blind Brook High School, Hickory High School, and Terrill Middle School

Many Worlds, Many Comics

The Digital Cuttlefish looks at the Archie comics, and waxes poetic: Two paths play out in a comic book, When Archie walks down memory lane “The road not taken” is the hook; So now, the writers take a look And re-write Archie’s life again, This time with Betty as his bride; Veronica the woman spurned,… Continue reading Many Worlds, Many Comics

Where I’m Going to Be

In the last couple of weeks, I have suddenly acquired a rather full travel schedule for the coming months. The odd thing is that none of these trips are book-publicity junkets– they’re all basically professional-type appearances, several of them taking place before How to Teach Physics to Your Dog hits stores on December 22. My… Continue reading Where I’m Going to Be

A. O. Scott Is an Ignoramus

Via His Holiness, there is an aggressively stupid paragraph in a New York Times movie review today: Did you hear the one about the guy who lived in the land of Uz, who was perfect and upright and feared God? His name was Job. In the new movie version, “A Serious Man,” some details have… Continue reading A. O. Scott Is an Ignoramus

Swashbuckling Through Quantum Optics

I’m teaching my Quantum Optics class again this term, out of a completely different textbook than last time around– I’m using Mark Fox’s Quantum Optics from the Oxford Master Series in AMO Physics, which is more of a regular textbook. I’ve got six students– four junior and senior physics majors, one senior chemistry major, and… Continue reading Swashbuckling Through Quantum Optics

DonorsChoose: Now That’s a Noble Cause

We’re currently in the early stages of the annual DonorsChoose fundraiser, helping to raise money for educational projects. This is especially important in the current economic climate– even before things went south, many schools and classrooms were strapped for cash, but now it’s even worse. But I can understand if that’s not a noble enough… Continue reading DonorsChoose: Now That’s a Noble Cause

Donors Choose 2009: Help Kids, Win Books

As you may have seen on some other ScienceBlogs blogs, it’s time again for the annual DonorsChoose fundraiser: If you haven’t been here in past years, DonorsChoose is a charity dedicated to education. They take specific proposals from school teachers looking for items to help their classes– anything from pens and paper to classroom furniture,… Continue reading Donors Choose 2009: Help Kids, Win Books

The Purposes and Problems of Labs

Over at Jim Henley’s place, Thoreau further justifies his status as an essential academic-physics blogger with a really good post about the problem of introductory labs: In freshman labs, generally you’re trying to measure something (at least as it’s done at many schools). The measurement is never as clean as the stuff being taught in… Continue reading The Purposes and Problems of Labs

Thursday Sense of Obligation Blogging

A couple of things that I’m not excited to blog about, but sort of feel like I ought to say something about: 1) The Washington Monthly article about StraighterLine, an online program that lets you take college courses for $99/mo. The article is all breathless excitement about the revolutionary transformative power of technology, but it… Continue reading Thursday Sense of Obligation Blogging