Tangled Up With You

A theoretical physicist walks into a bar. Specifically, Jim Al-Khalili walks into a recreation of a in 1920s speakeasy where a prohibition-era band is performing. It's a scene from The Secrets of Quantum Physics, episode 1: "Einstein's Nightmare" in which quantum entanglement is the theme. While Al-Khalili lists a few details to chronicle the zeitgeist while enjoying a beverage from his table, the club's chanteuse croons lamentingly of a love she cannot leave.

But careful observers quickly realize this is no ordinary torch song. It's infused with subtle physics cues. I appreciate the production team going the extra mile to create a gem that might be lost on many viewers. So after watching the episode, I hit the Internet to track down the details. 

Enjoy the fruits of my post-viewing web quest:

Tangled Up With You by Eliza's Uncertainty

I found lyrics to Nick Goodman's ditty online. They had a few errors, so here's my corrected accounting. 

Tangled Up With You

You got a heart but there's no way of knowing

Can see where you are but can't see where you are going

And I'm stuck here still

I'm tangled up with you

I know I deserve you

I know you're my savior

But when I observe you

You change your behavior

So I'm stuck here still

I'm tangled up with you

This whole world can be...

So uncertain

But you can bet that I'll still be hurting

When you say our wedding vows to somebody else

Well I've seen some things

I've been around

But darling there ain’t a finer thing that I've found

I'll always be so tangled up with you

I'll always be so tangled up with you

Eliza's Uncertainty - Voice: Eliza Shea, Bass: Misha Mullov-Abbado, Clarinet: Anthony Friend, Trombone: Vij Prakash, Guitar/Composition: Nick Goodwin

And I did manage to craft a question set for The Secrets of Quantum Physics. Episode 1, "Einstein's Nightmare," gets us up to speed on quantum entanglement ("spooky action at a distance"). Episode 2, "Let There Be Life," takes us into the nascent world of quantum biology. Many people might not even know quantum biology is a thing.

Where's my stuff?

I created a new blog to document the curriculum resources I have authored/created over the years. Specifically the ones that have been published beyond the realm of phyz.org. 

Phyz.org remains my "school-oriented" website. It began in the 1990s as a repository for most of my physics curriculum materials. I adopted the "Phyz" prefix from my mentor, the late Walt Scheider, Ann Arbor Huron High's 1983 Presidential Awardee for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching.

Phyz.org grew to be a useful place for sharing curriculum materials with students and teachers. My district eventually offered websites to teacher via a service vendor. The hope was that teachers would construct personal websites through this district service. Those who spent the time doing so then had the virtual rug pulled out from under them as the district switched its teacher web services vendor. 

I maintained phyz.org through a stream of district fits and starts. Schoolwires and Schoology are couple that I remember.

Over the years, I became friends with Paul Hewitt, who invited me to author lab manuals for Conceptual Science textbooks published by Pearson. I also wrote several "Figuring Physics" questions for Paul Hewitt's The Physics Teacher cartoon. Some of them are hosted at Arbor Scientific's Next Time Questions page.

The good people of CU/Boulder's PhET team had been producing solid computer simulations for years by the time I started developing activities around several of those sims. I posted my activities to PhET's libraries of activities. PhET is reconstructing the old (legacy) Flash and Java sims in HTML5. Some of these rebuilds break my activities. Sometimes I can fix things. Sometimes I cannot.

The skinny fish tank I designed for use in my classroom was picked up by Arbor Scientific, who named it the "Laser Viewing Tank". Refraction, total internal reflection, mirages, scattering, and diffraction were made immediate and accessible to students with these simple tanks.

In 2018, I began posting resources to Teachers Pay Teachers (TpT). I had made a purchase at TpT (and was grateful to do so), and decided I might have wares I could sell on that platform. I called my TpT store, The Lessons of Phyz.

It seemed like a good idea to wrangle my disparate resources in a manner I could provide background and/or usage tips. And a place where I can announce new things as I produce them. I settled on creating a new blog.

Pre-populating the new blog with extant resources was non-trivial. I had more stuff out there than I thought. The blog post dates are mostly ... "impressionistic," serving to be reasonably accurate and appropriately functional.

In any case, this is where my stuff is: The Lessons of Phyz.

One document format to rule them all

When the pandemic hit and schools closed down, I was knocked on my backside pretty hard in many ways.

One thing I found I needed to do—and quickly—was to convert my student curriculum documents into Google Docs format so that I could deploy them in Google Classroom. I had virtually no experience in Google Docs or Google Classroom. And I was facing four preps: Physics, AP Physics 1, AP Physics 2, and Conceptual Physics. A considerable mountain of work loomed.

I'm confident that my colleagues handled the transition better than I did. But I did my best. I transformed many of my documents (Apple Keynote files/PDFs) originally intended for printing and photocopying to Google Docs format for use in distance learning. I leveraged features that made the documents both student and teacher friendly. 

When school morphed again into "hybrid" (which will likely go down in history as the worst model of instruction ever implemented), the Google Docs fell a bit short. Certain elements that made the Google Docs useful for distance learning made them difficult to use for in-person instruction. I could use the old PDFs in-person and the new Google Docs for distance, but multiplying that load by four preps made that unpalatable.

A few modifications made the Google Docs versatile enough to be used successfully for both in-person and distance learning. I refer to these as Print-Friendly Google Docs. One file to rule them all. Precious to me!

In the summer of 2020, I whirled Dervishly to convert my Lessons of Phyz products from PDFs to Google Docs because if I needed Google Docs for remote teaching, so would everyone else. This summer, I am working feverishly to transform those Google Docs to Print-Friendly Google Docs because who knows what's next?

Breakthrough: Ideas that Changed the World, How Earth Made Us, Our Planet, One Strange Rock, and Pandemic are done. Everything else remains in progress or in the queue. 

And at long last, I finished a new product! First real, new item since Pandemic [Netflix series] in March, 2020. I branched out into chemistry with Jim Al-Khalili's BBC series, Chemistry: A Volatile History. I'll probably work on David Pogue's chemistry NOVAs next. This item is the first to be offered as a Google Drive digital download. No PDFs; no Zips. I foresee all my new products being posted to TpT that way.

Digital document evolution. I do not foresee an end to that.

RT;DL Electroscopia

Here is the second qualitative electrostatics lab redesigned and video clip enhanced for use in Distance Learning. The first was "A Pithy Matter" shown in a separate post.

For "Electroscopia," we swap out the pith balls for a can-form electroscope. These were sold with cardboard inserts with angle markings to make them more electrometer-ish. In practice, removing the insert allowed students working on opposite sides of the electroscope to see the pointer without obstruction. 

The activity works through a series of observations involving charge typing, induction, and the differences between conductors and insulators. It closes with some questions students should be able to answer with the benefit of evidence. 

There are appearances of the Fun Fly Stick, a latex balloon, and my head in this activity. Not to be missed!

Here's a taste.

Electroscopia at Teachers Pay Teachers includes:
Student Document (Google Docs)
Observations (HTML export, preferred—linked to in the student document)
Observations (Movie export for devices that struggle with the HTML export)
Mystery Objects and Mystery Charges Observations (link embedded in the Answer Key)
Answer Key (Google Docs)

In practice, students "ask for help" to summon the instructor to their breakout room. Once there, students request an Object or a Charge and identify their room number. The instructor shares their screen while showing the appropriate clip, then leaves the breakout room as students interpret the observations.

RT;DL A Pithy Matter

Sure, there's some kind of force involved in the rubbed plastic/pith ball interactions. But do we really need to consider it a whole new force? Isn't it just some form of gravity or magnetism? Let's experiment.

This qualitative exploration of electrostatics features: electrostatic attraction and repulsion, a triboelectric sequence (but we don't use the T-word here), an electrophorus (with pronunciation guidance), and two rounds of Pith Ball Ping Pong. What's not to like?

Let me just add that nothing—nothing—turned my most jaded, been-there-done-that high school seniors into elementary students more than this activity. When the pith balls started flying, their giddy glee was an involuntary reaction that expressed itself before they could so much as attempt to stifle it.

A Pithy Matter at Teachers Pay Teachers includes:

Student Document (print-friendly Google Docs)

A Pithy Matter - Observations (HTML export as linked within the GoogleDocs document). This is a sequence of video clips showing interactions between cloth-rubbed plastic and pith balls, with special appearances by an electrophorus (ft. slow-motion electrophorus ping). Here's the movie export of the observations for use on devices that struggle with the HTML export—link also included in gdoc).

A Pithy Matter - Special Observations (HTML export for use by the instructor). They will seem silly to experts with content knowledge, but they are actually critical for the purpose of this activity.

This activity was designed for use with video conferencing (e.g., Zoom). Students need to check in with the instructor to see the "Special Observations". It's a redesign of what was an in-class lab. I consider it a mark of success that I am able to use the same lab quiz (ported to Socrative for online use, of course) to assess student performance on the activity. 

The roughest edge for students in this activity is recognizing that the brick is far and away the "most gravitational" object in the apparatus and how it can be used in this lab. The instructions make an attempt to steer, but still... Once they get past that, most groups catch on to the value of the bar magnet. Most; not all. 

To the best of my knowledge, this activity is not duplicated or even simulated elsewhere in teh interwebz. No Pivots; no PhETs. I will be corrected in the comments if I am mistaken.

In Distance Learning, I'm everyone's lab partner in addition to being the instructor.

The Lessons of Phyz September 2020 update

Google Docs, Freebies, and Inadvisable Discounts

When the pandemic closed the schools, I scrambled like most teachers. Our worlds had been thrown upside down and there was an expectation that we'd simply "throw our lessons online," hold classes on Zoom, create YouTube channels of our lessons, etc., and leverage the best among the countless sophisticated online platforms intended to allow our instructional visions to flourish while engage students completely. 

Yeah...no.

More like an old desert-dweller suddenly cast into a roiling ocean while helicopters flew by and dropped materials that, when properly constructed, would make a nice boat. Or... we were expected to build the plane while it was in flight.

In any case, I found that the simple task of assigning a video for students to watch while answering questions was suddenly a challenge. Things worked better if the question sets were in Google Docs format. I could easily assign them and grade them (if need be) in Google Classroom. Many had been in PDF format: not edit-friendly for student work.

So I began the tedious task of transforming my video question sets from their PDF or Word formats to Google Docs. When I finished the ones I was in immediate need to use, I worked on all the others I had posted at The Lessons of Phyz, my Teachers Pay Teachers store.

So here's what's available—an available in Google Docs format, most sold separately or in bundles (at an inadvisable discount).

The Mechanical Universe (All 52 episodes)

The Mechanical Universe High School Adaptations (All 28 Episodes)

Conceptual Physics Alive! with Paul Hewitt (All 34 episodes)

YouTube Physics (quite a variety of topics covered)

Physics Modules (Mechanics, Heat & Temperature, Waves & Light, E&M, and Modern)

Skepticism (we need this so much right now)

Breakthrough: The Ideas That Changed the World (All 6 episodes)

Cosmos: A Personal Voyage (Carl Sagan's 1980 series, all 13 episodes)

Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey (Neil deGrasse Tyson-hosted 2014 series, all 13 episodes)

One Strange Rock (Will Smith-hosts, great for NGSS "The Living World" biology, all 10 episodes)

Our Planet (Think Planet Earth, but with an edge, all 8 episodes)

How Earth Made Us / How the Earth Changed History (Excellent BBC series, all 5 episodes)

Earth Science (Mapping, Atmosphere, Water, Weather, Human Impact, Geology, Solar System, Galaxies)

Pandemic: How to Stop an Outbreak (2020 Netflix series, all 6 episodes)

Two dozen resources are free of charge. Bundles are often discounted so heavily that I get a warning from TPT that I've gone too far. If your school has licensed TPT School Access, then I suppose all the resources are free for you.

Not long into the pandemic, TPT created a method for converting PDFs into Google Docs. By the time it was available to sellers, I was already too deep into the pain-staking process of converting them myself by hand. Well, by computer, but you know what I mean. So I just plowed through into the summer until everything in my store was converted.

I hope you find something that can help you this year and beyond.

Kinetic Karnival now on YouTube

Here's a post from 2009. Updated as I've added the videos to my YouTube channel. I downloaded them from Jearl Walker's MySpace page, where they were originally posted.

All six 30-minute episodes of Jearl Walker's classic television series, the Emmy-winning Kinetic Karnival, are available online at Walker's MySpace page. [Update: I can't access them on MySpace anymore, even in Chrome.] I recommend watching them before showing them in class, although I'm sure you'd do that anyway. There are a few brief moments that modern educators might find objectionable. Most of us find ways to work around such moments, but it's always best to be aware.

I developed video question sets for episodes 1, 2, 3, and 5. Students answer them while the video is in progress. They're up as PDFs in The Book of Phyz.

Here's a one-stop collection of Kinetic Karnival links for your convenience. If you like question sets matched to science videos, The Lessons of Phyz is the place for you.

1. Forces and Collisions [impact time and contact area]
In this episode, Jearl proves his virility and masculinity by chopping concrete bricks with his bare hands and volunteering as the meat for a “nail sandwich.”

Kinetic Karnival - Forces and Collisions - Question Set - Key

 

2. Rotation [circular motion and conservation of angular momentum]
I show this one in two distinct segments (one in my Physics 1 course, the other in AP Physics 2). The first third is devoted to circular motion. The second two-thirds is devoted to angular momentum. Do I dislike the blending of these distinct topics? Yes. Do I have the talent and ability to produce my own series? Not so much. In any case, this episode features Jearl in a swim suit!

Kinetic Karnival - Rotation
Video Question Set 1 (UCM) 

Video Question Set 2 (Angular Momentum) - Key


3. Fluid Flow and Friction
In this episode, Jearl debunks the drain swirl myth from the bathtub, describes an early dating disaster, explains the tablecloth trick, and hangs a spoon from his nose.

Kinetic Karnival - Fluid Flow & Friction - Question Set - Key

4. Viscosity [non-newtonian fluids, quicksand, and corn starch]
Jearl enjoys tinkering with viscous and non-newtonian fluids. He gets stuck in quicksand and jumps feet-first into a pot of unflavored gravy.
Video [Sorry, I didn't grab it when I should have.]

5. The Leidenfrost Effect [heat transfer and phase change]
Arguably the best program of the series, though it does contain a "politically-incorrect/racially insensitive" moment. When Jearl complains about "the problem" with iron-cooked crepes, you might find the mute button on the remote control of your playback system. A few moments of mute will spare you an apologetic discussion afterward. Features the hand into molten lead, liquid nitrogen in the mouth, and firewalking.

Kinetic Karnival - The Leidenfrost Effect - Question Set - Key

6. The Science of Cooking
Jearl prepares a meal for a dinner date with a young lady. Along the way, he describes the physics and chemistry of a variety of dishes. And the date turns out as you might expect.
Video [Sorry, I didn't grab it when I should have.]

My Mechanical Universe Sagrada Família

I've been enjoying moving my Mechanical Universe curriculum out of the classroom and into the realm of YouTube homework this year. Posting the high school adaptations to YouTube and having a one-stop index webpage that links to every episode makes it easy. And they wouldn't be a part of my curriculum if I didn't have question sets to accompany them.

Every once in a while, I prefer to use a full college edition during a unit. So I decided to jump down the rabbit hole and begin developing Lessons of Phyz question sets for the college edition episodes. So far, I've been able to put together 12 sets.

[12/7/19 Update: 17 sets]

So that means there are only 40 35 episodes left to go. And writing a question set for a Mechanical Universe episode is a heavy lift compared to writing them for more straight-forward science documentaries. So I don't foresee completing all 52 episodes any time before 2022.

I have divided the series into six groups that make sense to me. In the event that I complete any of those groups, a TpT bundle will be assembled. When the whole series is completed, a megabundle will be prepared. 2022 will be a great time to be alive! Until then, I'll add question sets as I make them. One at a time. Unhurried.

For now, take a look and see if there's anything you can use before we get to that 2022 paradise, college or high school.

The Mechanical Universe of Phyz page (with links to every episode, college and high school)

Basilica de la Sagrada Família is the famous Barcelona church designed by Antoni Gaudí to be constructed on a 100-year+ timetable. The last true Alan Parsons Project album was all about Gaudí, and the opening track was La Sagrada Faília.

Mechanical Universe all episode access page

If you want a single page with easy-to-find links to every episode of The Mechanical Universe, we have something in common.

I made such a page and posted it to my phyz.org domain.

College (half-hour) episode links are on the top table, High School Adaptations are listed on the bottom table. I arranged the episodes into groups that make sense to me. I hope they make sense to you, too.

I use the high school version with question sets in my classes. Links to the question sets on my Teachers Pay Teachers site, The Lessons of Phyz, can also be found on the page.

With all episodes of The Mechanical Universe (college and high school) streaming for free, I'm moving these video presentations away from class time to "YouTube homework."

Since I couldn't find anyone selling or streaming the high school adaptations of The Mechanical Universe, I posted them, myself. I wrote about that in a previous post.

Here's the page: The Mechanical Universe of Phyz.

http://phyz.org/mechanicaluniverse/

Breakthrough: The Ideas that Changed the World

The Next Generation Science Standards place a new importance on engineering. There will be initiatives and ideas for how to engage students in designing and building things in class.

If we want to enmesh engineering into the fabric of our curriculum, we might want to consider shining a spotlight on the engineering history a few key inventions. The PBS series, Breakthrough: The Ideas the Changed the World shines that light on six such triumphs of engineering. The series played on PBS this past spring It streams on Amazon Prime. And the DVD set of the series, hosted by Patrick Stewart, is now available. Here's a rundown of the episodes.

The Telescope
Episode 1 tells the story of the development of the telescope, from a stone-age observatory to the space-based telescopes of the future.

It entails long-abandoned Stone Age dolmens once used as celestial calendars,
how Venetians made glass transparent, the optics of a medieval Persian camera obscura, a Dutch lens maker’s wartime breakthrough and a Venetian math teacher’s advancement of it, a Parisian invention improved by a spilled bottle of mercury, a team of women known as human computers who were armed with fly spankers, an athlete-turned-astronomer working high above Los Angeles, and telescope in space that will allow us to see as far as physics will allow.

Episode 1 "breakthrough celebrities" include Galileo Galilei, Edwin Hubble, Henrietta Swan Leavitt, Louis Daguerre, Hans Lippershey, and Ibn al-Haytham.

The Airplane
Episode 2 tells the story of the development of the airplane, from early human-powered attempts to the jet concepts of the future.

It involves a ninth-century moorish daredevil’s first attempt at human flight, how we had tails before we had wings, an artist obsessed with anatomy and flight, a whirling arm in the stairwell of a seaside mansion, the rubber band’s role in flight, the curve of a stork's wing, a connection to maritime technology and the gyroscope, the use of a deep-sea diving suit to fly high, why modern pilots are pressure tested, and the surprising efficiency of the jet propulsion gas turbine.

Episode 2 "breakthrough celebrities" include Leonardo da Vinci, Wilbur Wright, Orville Wright, George Cayley, James Doolittle, Wiley Post, Frank Whittle, Elmer Sperry, Lawrence Sperry, Otto Lilienthal, Alphonse Penaud, and Ibn Firnas.

The Robot
In episode 3, Locutus of Borg tells the story of the development of the robot. Well, Patrick Stewart is the series narrator, so... close enough!

It involves the ancient legend of Hephaestus and rudimentary Greek automatons,
a device that could learn a new tune and repeat it exactly, a desire to produce navigation tables by steam, the linguistic contribution of a Slavic cubist painter, the breakthrough of storage for programs, an imitation game, an electronic tortoise, a mission to Mars, a nuclear disaster in Japan, and the challenges of balance and hands.

Episode 3 "breakthrough celebrities" include Alan Turing, Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, Hero of Alexandria, William Grey Walter, The Banû Mûsâ brothers.

The Car

Episode 4 tells the story of the development of the car, from ancient sleds powered by primitive dogs to autonomous vehicles powered by graphene batteries. Gary Numan was not available for the narration, so Patrick Stewart handled the voice-over.

It involves ancient arctic sled dogs, the pairing the axle to the wheel, the smelting of metals from rocks, the spreading of a language, the need to pump water out of mines, the boring of naval canons, a stunt carried out by an inventor’s wife, the efficiencies of a slaughterhouse, and the promise of graphene.

Episode 4 "breakthrough celebrities" include Henry Ford, Karl Benz, Bertha Benz, James Watt, Thomas Edison, John Wilkinson, Thomas Newcomen, and Jay Leno.

The Rocket

Episode 5 tells the story of the development of the rocket, from ancient guano-powered fireworks to plasma rockets with magnetic confinement. 

It involves the use of bat guano from Chinese caves to drive off evil spirits, a modern-day celebratory rocket battle in Greece, a work of fiction by a famous astronomer, an imaginative tale about a trip to the moon, a visionary living in rural Russia, a breakthrough in dairy processing technology, a loophole in an international treaty, a repurposing of firefighting equipment, internal Soviet geopolitical subterfuge that stoked the Space Race, and plasma engines that could transport humanity to other worlds.

Episode 5 "breakthrough celebrities" include Robert Goddard,  Werner Von Braun, 

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky,  Jules Verne,  Ti Tian,  Sergei Korolov, Karl Gustav, Thomas Harriot, and Johannes Kepler.

The Smartphone

Episode 6 tells the story of the development of the smartphone, from the fall of Carthage to brain-interfaced apps of the future.

It involves ancient Roman battlefield communications, a painter-turned-inventor who devised a code still in use today, a groundbreaking technology whose rightful inventor had to be settled by the US Supreme Court, an obsessive inventor who found treasure in another scientist’s trash, a quirky keyboard talking machine, a Hollywood starlet who was also a prolific inventor keen to defeat the Nazis, the miniaturization of a circuit invented by an engineer who hadn’t yet earned vacation time, and a father eager to share a photograph of his newborn daughter with friends and family.

Episode 6 "breakthrough celebrities" include Alexander Graham Bell, Samuel Morse, Guglielmo Marconi, Hedy LaMarr, George Antheil, Jack Kilby, Polybius, Philippe Kahn, Homer Dudley, and Elisha Gray.

I produced companion question sets for each episode. They can be found at The Lessons of Phyz at Teachers Pay Teachers: Breakthrough—The Ideas the Changed the World.

Our Planet (Netflix series)

Sometimes I go somewhere for spring break. This year I went everywhere on our planet.

Our Planet | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix


As described by the producers:

Our Planet is a groundbreaking, four-year collaboration between Netflix, Silverback Films and WWF. It explores the rich natural wonders, iconic species and wildlife spectacles that still remain, and reveals the key issues that urgently threaten their existence. Today, we have become the greatest threat to the health of our planet. 

Our joint mission is to inspire people over the world to understand our planet - and the challenges it faces. If we can truly understand why nature matters to us all, and what we can do to save it, then we can create a future where nature and people thrive. 

It is very BBC Planet Earth-esque in many ways: stunning wildlife photography accompanied by a David Attenborough narration. But in it's storytelling, it does describe human impact. There are times when that impact is beneficial, but more often it is detrimental. Appallingly detrimental.

But no part of the series is "pollution porn". No images of filth being pumped into waterways or oil-covered birds struggling amid the sludge.

By and large it is a celebration of nature as it remains and an assurance that, given the opportunity, the extent to which it can recover. And photography tools and techniques have advanced significantly since Planet Earth was made.

There are disturbing vignettes. The fungus that bursts forth from the corpse of an ant whose dying behavior it commandeered, the successful orca hunt of an outmatched penguin, and "the walrus scene". The walrus scene will likely stay with me for a very long time. It should be noted that the entire eight-episode series is rated TV-G.

I may never have need or cause to direct my own students to watch this series. But others might. It seems very much in line with the NGSS three-course model's "The Living Earth". But I know I'm unwilling to use expository video resources without an accompanying set of questions. For long-form videos such as each episode of Our Planet, a sequence of surface-level questions can keep students focused on the narrative.

So I spent a significant portion of spring break preparing video question sets that teachers could use with students while watching any or all episodes of the series. For me, that requires first screening the episode as a passive audience member. Next I go through the process of watching and listening and pausing while I allow the text of the narration to suggest possible questions.

Fill-in-the-blanks are simple and can be effective. Sometimes. But not when the key word or phrase is something like "Rub' al Khali" or name of any exotic place or organism. Multiple choice can be deployed here, but it's key to develop distractors of such quality that even a clever student would be attracted to a wrong answer if they were not paying attention.

There are occasions in which multi-select checklists are appropriate. Rarely, it is even possible to create a matching sequence.

In any case, I came up with Our Planet (Netflix) Video Question Sets and have posted them to The Lessons of Phyz at Teachers Pay Teachers.

Often the producers of such programs will develop deep and expansive curriculum through which an instructor could make a semester or yearlong course based on the documentary series. And the producers of Our Planet have produced a companion book for the series.

For now, my own classroom interests have never risen to that level of ambition. Not even for The Mechanical Universe. I prefer to incorporate the resources rather than to be incorporated by them.

If you know someone who might want to replace their use of Planet Earth with something a little more environmentally conscious, send them this post. Our planet is stunningly gorgeous, as is Our Planet.

It's a great day to be skeptical!

I've been developing "skepticism in the classroom" resources for quite a while. I've posted a bunch of them to The Lessons off Phyz at Teachers Pay Teachers. I drop them into my curriculum throughput the year, when the moment is right. Sometimes they are assigned as "YouTube Homework".

YouTube Skepticism: Baloney Detection Kit
This activity engages students as they watch a 14-minute video on a so-called "Baloney Detection Kit". It's a structured implementation of Carl Sagan's quote, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and acts as a filter when students are confronted with claims.

YouTube Skepticism: The First Moon Office
This activity compares the science of meteors and apparent weightlessness with how those phenomena are represented in a Federal Express television advertisement.

YouTube Skepticism: Power Balance
Power Balance bracelets burst onto the scene a few years ago and enjoyed explosive success. There were "knock-offs," fakes, and the company gathered so much cash it bough the naming rights to sports and entertainment complex in Sacramento: what had been ARCO Arena became Power Balance Pavilion. The activity brings students through the claims and the tests of those claims. Power Balance has since declared bankruptcy, but similar products (targeted toward baseball players) persist. There will always be such products, I hope my students do not buy them.

YouTube Skepticism: Magnet Boys
This activity allows students to consider several cases of so-called "magnet boys" that swarmed the Internet a few years ago. The cases pose interesting questions, and magician and skeptic, James Randi, has an idea of what might be going on.

YouTube Skepticism: Cell Phone Popcorn
This activity has students observe and investigate a set of viral videos that took YouTube by storm a few years ago: ordinary people were using their cell phones to pop popcorn. The videos leas students into a revealing investigation.

The Secrets of the Psychics
Nova's Secrets of the Psychics. Magician and skeptic, James "The Amazing" Randi, exposes so-called psychics at home and abroad. It's a serious topic, but there are a great many laughs to be had.

Merchants of Doubt
Question set and answer key to accompany Merchants of Doubt (Sony Classic Pictures). This documentary exposes the parallels of the tactics used by the tobacco industry and climate change deniers, among others.

Skepticism Bundle—The Whole Shebang!
All of the above.

More skepticism in the classroom resources can be found at

Skepticism in the Classroom (Dean Baird)

Skepticism in the Classroom (my buddy, Matt Lowry—physics instructor and skeptic extraordinaire)

YouTube Physics at The Lessons of Phyz

I have assembled and posted several web video based lessons to The Lessons of Phyz at Teachers Pay Teachers.

1. Dodge Nitro Jump
This activity engages students with a practical problem. A motorist is trying to revive his broken-down car. A second motorist offers assistance. When a jump-start is arranged, things take an unexpected turn in the parking lot at Beachs. An understanding of algebraic kinematics is required here. Certainly appropriate for AP Physics 1.

2. Tavurvur Erupts!
This activity engages students with a dramatic video that captures the initial moments of a volcanic eruption. An adiabatic expansion cloud appears and disappears, a shock wave shocks observers capturing the video, and huge boulders trace graceful arc through the air, taking many seconds to eventually crash back into the ocean. Careful analysis of the video and knowledge of physics, and the use of PhET's Flash-based "Projectile Motion" sim allows students to determine the distance to the volcano and the launch speed of those boulders. How safe were the people filming the eruption?
Add this to your mix of classroom demonstrations and lab activities to thoroughly teach the topic at hand. I developed this activity for use with my own students.

3. Inertia
This activity engages students with a few popular inertia related videos found on YouTube. Video addresses are given in the document. Since such addresses can sometimes go bad, search terms are used as titles. Examples here include "Shopping Cart Fail," "Unloading Bamboo Like a Boss," "Car Bowling Fail," and "BMW Tablecloth Trick XXXL". A Mythbusters video is also employed, as is a hilarious clip from a pair of charming German child actors.

4. Car Crash Safety
This activity engages students with Griff Jones' classic, Understsanding Car Crashes: It's Basic Physics. I use this as a review of mechanics. The activity then goes on to have students find the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's rating of vehicles they drive or are passengers in. Or aspire to own. The activity finishes with a pair or head-on collision tests showing that vehicle safety regulations have demonstrable, positive effects on vehicle design. Students are very interested in cars, so they find this activity very engaging.

5. Rolling Through Roundabouts in a Reliant Robin
This activity engages students with an amusing vignette from Britain's Top Gear automobile-themed program. It addresses a considerable design flaw in the three-wheeled Reliant Robin automobile. As is customary on Top Gear, the flaw is highlighted mercilessly, hilariously, and a solution is implemented. The activity is even more fun when the optional background research is done.

6. Backyard Water Slide
This activity engages students with a practical problem. A video shows a backyard water slide enthusiast who slides down a formidable incline that bends into a jump. The enthusiast overshoots the intended landing point. Onlookers burst into laughter. Students work through the physics of why things turned out as they did, even if reasonable precautions were taken. An understanding of rotational kinetic energy in rolling is required here. Appropriate for AP Physics 1.

7. Victoria Phyz Falls
This activity engages students fairly deeply with a thrill-seeking stunt I performed when I visited Victoria Falls on the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe in 2014. Bungee jumping is an activity rich with physics. And this jump, filmed at the Victoria Falls Bridge, does not disappoint. Six pages of analysis interrogate the mechanics of the jump quite thoroughly. Multiple representations are implemented. An understanding of harmonic motion and Hooke's Law is required here. Appropriate for AP Physics 1.

8. Color Mixing
This activity engages students with two videos that relate to color mixing. One from Science Friday shows the amazing camouflage capabilities of cephalopods via biological pixels called chromatophores. The other from the Royal Institution tells the story of how the brain and the receptors in our eyes "invent" magenta.

9. Polarized + Blue
This activity engages students with two videos: Physics Girl explores optical polarization in "Only Some Humans Can See This Type of Light" and KQED goes for a deep dive into on structural color in "Magnificent Blue".

And I'm tinkering with the notion of a bundle, hence: YouTube Physics BUNDLE. All nine lessons at a discount.

The Lessons of Phyz — 2019

The Lessons of Phyz store at Teachers Pay Teachers is now one year old and features even more items than it did last time I posted about it. I know, right? It began with question sets for the classic, Mechanical Universe: High School Adaptation—a video series that you can neither buy nor stream in 2019. Since then, I've added video question sets to more than cover your next jury duty needs. Here are all the delicious digital documents on offer as of February, 2019.

Cosmos: A Personal Journey by Carl Sagan [1980]. Question sets for all 13 episodes: The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean, One Voice in the Cosmic Fugue, Harmony of the Worlds, Heaven and Hell, Blues for a Red Planet, Travellers' Tales, The Backbone of Night, Journeys in Space and Time, The Lives of the Stars, The Edge of Forever, The Persistence of Memory, Encyclopaedia Galactica, Who Speaks for Earth?




Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey hosted by Neil deGrasse Tyson [2014]. Question sets for all 13 episodes: Standing Up in the Milky Way, Some of the Things That Molecules Do, When Knowledge Conquered Fear, A Sky Full of Ghosts, Hiding in the Light, Deeper Deeper Deeper Still, The Clean Room, Sisters of the Sun, Hidden Worlds of Planet Earth, The Electric Boy, The Immortals, The World Set Free, Unafriad of the Dark. 





How Earth Made Us | How the Earth Changed History by Professor Iain Stewart. Question sets for all five episodes: Deep Earth | Beneath the Crust, Water | Water World, Wind | The Skies Above, Fire | The Gift of Fire, Human Planet | The Human Era.






Physics: Electricity and Magnetism. Question sets for documentary program episodes, Lightning!, Search for the Super Battery, Magnetic Storm, Aurora - Fire in the Sky.

Physics: Modern Physics. Question sets for feature-length documentary films, Einstein's Big Idea and Atomic Café.

The Singles Series
Single-item question sets. Some are included in modules elsewhere in The Lessons of Phyz.
Merchants of Doubt
Before the Flood
Secrets of the Psychics

The Mechanical Universe: High School Adaptation
Mechanical Universe 1: Motion and Forces
The Law of Falling Bodies, The Law of Inertia, Newton’s Laws, Moving in Circles

Mechanical Universe 2: Gravity
Kepler’s Laws, The Apple and The Moon, Navigating in Space, Curved Space and Black Holes

Mechanical Universe 3: Conservation
Conservation of Energy, Conservation of Momentum, Angular Momentum

Mechanical Universe 4: Temperature, Vibrations, and Waves
Temperature and the Gas Laws, Harmonic Motion, Introduction to Waves

Mechanical Universe 5: Electrostatics
Electric Fields and Forces, Equipotentials and Fields, Potential Difference and Capacitance, The Millikan Experiment

Mechanical Universe 6: Circuits And Magnetism

Simple DC Circuits, Magnetic Fields, Electromagnetic Induction, Alternating Current 

Mechanical Universe 7: Light And The Atom
Wave Nature of Light, Models of the Atom, Wave-Particle Duality

The Earth Science Series

Earth Science 1: Science, Mapping, and Water
Secret of the Psychics, Lost at Sea: The Search for Longitude, Water, Earth Under Water

Earth Science 2: Atmosphere and Weather
Our Atmosphere, Predicting Weather, Wind

Earth Science 3: Climate Change and Human Impact
Megastorm Aftermath, Before the Flood, Human Planet

Earth Science 4: Tectonics, Volcanoes, and Earthquakes
Colliding Continents, Deep Earth, Deadliest Volcanoes, Deadliest Earthquakes

Earth Science 5: Astronomy in the Solar System
Meteor Strike, Life Beyond Earth: 1. Are We Alone?, 2. Moons & Beyond, Secrets of the Sun

Earth Science 6: Astronomy Beyond the Solar System
Life & Death of a Star, Invisible Universe Revealed, Alien Planets Revealed, Alien Galaxies

Question sets covering Paul Hewitt's Conceptual Physics Alive! video series are available from Arbor Scientific in two ways: The Complete Edition (hard copies and PDFs on DVD) and Disk Edition (PDFs on DVD).

Earth Science Week 5: Astronomy Beyond the Solar System

Okay, the title here might not be the most perfect fit. But it meshes so nicely with the title of Series 4, I went with it.

Stars, exoplanets, galaxies, and such. This is the grooviest stuff in Earth Science if you ask me.

The Hubble retrospective, Nova's Invisible Universe Revealed, puts a catch in my throat and tears on my cheek every time I watch it.

And when you get Alex Filippenko and Neil deGrasse Tyson in the same video (as you do in The Universe's Life and Death of a Star), I'm in!

The hot links to the videos below were active when I posted this, but may well have moved on by the time you read this. Your resilience and resourcefulness will get you access to these documentaries.

Earth Science Series 5: Astronomy Beyond the Solar System

5.1. Stars. The Universe: Life and Death of a Star
The History Channel wants you to go through them to gain access.

5.2. Exoplanets. NOVA: Life Beyond Earth 2. Moons and Beyond



5.3. Hubble Space Telescope. NOVA: Invisible Universe Revealed



5.4. Galaxies The Universe: Alien Galaxies



Here's a link to the Lessons of Phyz question sets at Teachers Pay Teachers:
Earth Science Series 5: Astronomy Beyond the Solar System

Earth Science Week 4: Astronomy in the Solar System

Having addressed earth, wind, and water in previous sets, it's time to look beyond the atmosphere.

The first time I watched Nova's Meteor Strike, I nearly fell out of my chair. My University of Michigan dorm mate and Physics 401 classmate, Dan Durda, was one of the interviewed scientists.

He and I (and other similarly interested Michigan friends) enjoyed Jim Loudon's Astrofests religiously back in the day. And that 401 class was a shared experience, to be sure. Humbling, but at least it was taught by the outstanding Dr. Jean Krisch, who pointed me in the direction of the inimitable Walt Scheider when it came time for me to do my student teaching.  I was flooded with fond memories when science rockstar, Dan Durda, popped up on the screen.

But I digress. It's a blog; digressions are allowed (if not openly encouraged).

As always, the hot links to videos shown below will likely expire and move on. Use your judgment, resources, and Google-fu to access the content. These videos do tend to be available for purchase.

Earth Science Series 4: Astronomy in the Solar System

4.1. Sun Earth Moon. NOVA: Meteor Strike


4.2. The Solar System. NOVA: Life Beyond Earth 1. Are We Alone?


4.3. Stars. NOVA: Secrets of the Sun

Here is the link to the Lessons of Phyz question sets at Teachers Pay Teachers to accompany these videos:

Earth Science Series 4: Astronomy in the Solar System

Earth Science Week 3: Tectonics, Volcanoes, and Earthquakes

Okay, let's take it down a notch. Right down to the crust. Maybe even deeper.

After yesterday's behemoth, this series turned out to be on the brief side, weighing in at a mere 7 pages of content (7 student pages; 7 key pages). But it's core Earth Science...

Earth Science Series 3: Tectonics, Volcanoes, and Earthquakes

3.1. Plate Tectonics. Naked Science: Colliding Continents


3.2. Volcanoes. NOVA: Deadliest Volcanoes
I streamed this one from the PBS app on my AppleTV.

3.3. Earthquakes. NOVA: Deadliest Earthquakes
I streamed this one from the PBS app on my AppleTV.

Here's the link to the Lessons of Phyz question sets at Teachers Pay Teachers.
Earth Science Series 3: Tectonics, Volcanoes, and Earthquakes

Earth Science Week 2: Atmosphere, Weather, and Climate

With the prelims out of the way, this series gets straight into it. The atmosphere, weather, storms, and climate. It's only Tuesday, but this is the most ambitious series of the five I've prepared in Earth Science. Fourteen pages of video question goodness. Focus will be maintained!

The hot linked videos (where available) below may or may not be the best versions that currently stream. Video hot-links are highly ephemeral. Use your Google-fu or purchase hard media versions for better results.

Series 2: The Atmosphere, Weather, and Climate.

2.1. The Atmosphere. National Geographic: Our Atmosphere


2.2. Weather. Modern Marvels: Predicting Weather


2.3. Storms. NOVA: Megastorm Aftermath


2.4. Climate. National Geographic: Before the Flood
This one streamed for free for a short period after it was released. It now streams for a fee. In fairness, it is a major production that is very much worth owning.

Here's the Lessons of Phyz link to the question sets on Teachers Pay Teachers:
Series 2: The Atmosphere, Weather, and Climate.

Earth Science Week 1: Science, Mapping, and Water

I taught a non-lab science Earth Science course a few years ago. I looked for recent-vintage, high-quality documentaries that might complement the textbook resources.

But as mentioned in other posts, I can never bring myself to show a video presentation cold. There needs to be a support document to help keep students focused on the content. The resulting video question sheets have been added to The Lessons of Phyz at Teachers Pay Teachers.

For this post, I'll try to hot link to the videos that go with each question set. Hot links often go cold as time goes by. If a video streams, one's Google-fu doesn't necessarily need to be strong to locate it.

Earth Science Series 1: Science, Mapping, and Water

1.1 About Science. NOVA's The Secrets of the Psychics


1.2 Mapping. NOVA's Lost at Sea: The Search for Longitude


1.3 Water: How Earth Changed History: Water


1.4 Water: National Geographic: Earth Under Water


The question sets on TPT can be found at this link:
Earth Science Series 1: Science, Mapping, and Water