teacher workshops & hands-on activities

The Salty Science of the Aluminum-Air Battery

Publication in The Physics Teacher (December 2008).

Fruit batteries and saltwater batteries are excellent ways to explore simple circuits in the classroom. These are examples of air batteries in which metal reacts with oxygen in the air in order to generate free electrons, which flow through an external circuit and do work. Students are typically told that the salt or fruit water acts as an electrolyte to bring electrons from the anode to the cathode. That’s true, but it leaves the battery as a black box. Physics teachers often don’t have the background to explain the chemistry behind these batteries. We’ve written this paper to explore the electrochemistry behind an air battery using copper cathode, aluminum anode, and saltwater. PDF of article.

workshop

Attack of the PodPeople!
Using and making podcasts in the classroom
CCSF Math, Science, Technology conference, June 2007

We learned about listening to, downloading, and making podcasts in the classroom. Download PDF of handouts, Head Harp string activity, Editing using Audacity, or Editing using Garageband.

In a half-day workshop we learned about using and creating podcasts for the classroom. We listened to some great podcasts that students and teachers can listen to, and created a collaborative class podcast! Download workshop handouts and Go to Podomatic website with final class podcast

A series of electrostatics activities from a workshop I taught in San Mateo -- flying the hydra, exploring the electrostatic world with sticky tape, and zap yourself with a pie plate. Download handout.

How does surface area and volume affect, like, everything? Chemistry, cell biology, thermodynamics, combustion? Click here for workshop materials (videos, activity handouts, etc.)

Spectrum at your fingertips
Fabulous science fashion

Your nails can be a fun way to show the different ways that colors can be categorized. The choice of 7 colors (ROYGBIV) for the visible spectrum is arbitrary, plus there are 'invisible' colors! You can also show different schemes for color mixing (CYMK and RGB). PDF

Rice can be dyed a myriad of colors to be used in a variety of activities, such as the rice model of the atmosphere. Download PDF of activity.

Styrofoam will rapidly dissolve (à la the Wicked Witch), disappearing into a soupy mush, when placed in acetone, but not in water. Starch packing peanuts, however, break down in water but not acetone. Covers concepts of solvents and solutions ("like dissolves like", polymer chemistry, and scientific observation. PDF

activity

Use free software to explore the shape of your voice and musical instruments, and examine an audio illusion. A great activity to go along with a sound or waves lesson. The realtime spectral analysis of the voice and instruments is deeply engaging.

(1) Handout using TEEMS2 Soundgrapher, or (2) handout using Spectrafoo and Audacity. And here's a spectrafoo screenshot and Audacity screenshot.

Visualize magnetic fields, and make cool magnetic art, with ferrofluid. Several alternate recipes are given, as well as some activities to do with the fluid. See me on Iron Science Teacher, doing a ferrofluid demonstration. (Real Media file). Activity PDF.

activity

Juice from Juice
Make your own blackberry juice solar cell

Using blackberry juice, iodine, and a few simple materials you can make a Graetzel cell -- a type of solar cell that mimics the process of photosynthesis. PDF