Jefferson Lab - Science Education Resources

There are several National Science Laboratories in the United States.  One of these, the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (Jefferson Lab), has a nice collection of  resources for middle school and high school science classrooms.

The Jefferson Lab Science Education site, iPad and chromebook friendly, contains resources for the teacher and student, including loads of games and videos, to assist with the physical science classrooms.  

Games can include Element Hangman

Or Speed Math Deluxe.

 

Watch videos from the Frostbite Theater where Joanna and Steve provide you with many liquid nitrogen experiments, as well as other scientific eye catching topics.  These videos are typically 1-4 minutes in length.





Another video series hosted at Jefferson Lab is Physics Out Loud containing 1-4 minute videos regarding many explanation of common words used in nuclear physics research.

If you are interested in hearing a 40 minute lecture from highly credible scientists, check out archived science lectures from as far back as the early 90's. Many interesting topics to choose from.


Again, a nice collection resources to help students learn and review physical science concepts.

Klikaklu - Picture Matching Treasure Hunts

Are you familiar with Geocaching, where you use GPS to find a hidden treasure by navigating to a location and using some clues if necessary?  Do you remember the scavenger hunts you went on as a kids where you collected a series of objects from around the neighborhood?





Klikaklu is a free app available for iPhone, iPad, and even Android.  This free app allows you to navigate through a modern treasure hunt.  At each stop there is a photo, find the photo, match it with your iDevice, and proceed onto the next stage. If you complete the hunt successfully, a reward may be waiting on the end.

Where do you find these treasure hunts, or better yet, can you make them?  Klikaklu just revised their app so during the first seven days after installation you can create treasure hunts.  After seven days, you'll need to purchase the upgrade for $4.99 to be able to create new or modify existing treasure hunts.

When creating a Klikaklu hunt you will have two options, either linearly where students progress from clue to clue in order, or as a scavenger hunt where they get all the clues up front and can find them in any order.





This would be a great activity to have incoming students at your school, for instance Freshman orientation day, find different locations throughout the school property.

You could use this activity for regular classes where each stop is a question, math, science, or language arts, and they must generate answers along the way.  Klikaklu has this feature built in where you can have students answer multiple choice, true false, short text, or number questions at each clue and upon completion of the hunt.

For creative writers you could put stops where words are visible,  students must bring back the words they found, and when finished write a story using all the words they chose to bring back.

Klikaklu would be very entertaining for those special days throughout your school calendar. 

Who knows, maybe you'll find that pot of gold at the end of your next treasure hunt.

Apps to Celebrate Computer Science Week Dec 9 - 13

Next week is Computer Science Week and it's a great time to introduce coding and programming to your students.  Code.org is recruiting classrooms around the country to participate in an hour of coding next week with their Hour of Code.    Check out the great programs, computer science statistics, and lessons for teachers to use on this site.  There are also some great apps for the iPads to introduce students to the concept of programming.

Kodable  
Free app that would be great for introducing students of any age to the basics of programming with drag and drop features.  No reading required, collect cute little fuzz ball characters, and work through the first section with over 35 levels to master.  Purchase additional levels for $1.99 or go Pro with the app for $6.99.  




Daisy the Dinosaur 
Free basic app for beginning elementary coders.  Students must be able to read to follow the instructions for the challenges.  Drag and drop format to make Daisy do what is needed. 


Hopscotch
Free app based on MIT's Scratch program.  This is also drag and drop with a great free play atmosphere allowing students to program their characters to move, draw lines, add words, and respond to movements of the iPad.  One of the top rated apps, and a great way to allow students to create!




Light-Bot, Lite (Free), Hour of Code(Free)
There are three versions of this app, for the Hour of Code there are 18 different challenges for the students.    There is an additional lite version of the app as well as a pro version available. 



Have students work together to problem solve and achieve a common goal, helping the grow in their problem solving skills, collaboration, and perseverance.  You may have the next great computer programmer in your room right now!

Jan Cuny

Program Officer, National Science Foundation

“All of today’s kids will need—along with reading, writing, and arithmetic—a basic understanding of computation and the role that it plays across a wide range of disciplines. Coding is engaging and empowering. It’s a necessary 21st Century skill.“

(from Code.org)