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Resources

Life/Environmental

The LeTaS! teachers found these books to be particularly helpful:

Other helpful resources:

Science Daily
In addition to listing the most up to date science research news, this website, under the tab entitled “Articles”, provides definitions and explanations for many regularly used terms used in the science field, the majority of which are taken from the website Wikipedia. Overall, the site is very well organized and easy to navigate.

Science News for Kids
This website features science news articles targeted at and written for school age children. There are also puzzle and lab “Zones” with science based activities for children to enjoy as well as a “Teacher Zone” providing science materials and resources for teachers and parents. This website is suitable for children to explore on their own or with a teacher for guidance. Although not extensive the website shows potential.

Biology Online
A website that provides information on the life sciences in the form of tutorials, references and an online dictionary of biology terms.

Science: How Stuff Works
This website explore a wide range of topics from animal profiles to genetics and conservation and provides detailed and well written explanations of “how things work” for teachers to draw from when presenting new topics to students. The website provides information and topic ideas for teachers wishing to add to their background knowledge and classroom lessons.

Science Master: Life Science
The goal of this website is to provide science resources for teachers and parents by providing links to other sites home to science content information, research news, lesson plans, activities, and project ideas. The website is not that well organized but has the potential to offer content knowledge.

Teacher’s Domain: Life Sciences
A nice website designed to “broaden teachers’ knowledge of science content”. This site is very well organized, and covers a wide range of life science topics, even listing the student age group they are targeted at.

National Geographic
A great website providing extensive science information and news. A great resource for teachers wanting to learn more about, amongst other things, current life and environmental science topics and provide up to date and exciting examples to their students.

Kiddyhouse
The intention of this website is to provide life science resources for students and teachers. It lists large number of links to websites dealing with a wide variety of science based topics.

Federal Resources for Education Excellence
This website hosts and provides links to science based information from federal agencies.

Backyard Nature
A fun website introducing students to nature and ecology in their own back yards. A useful website for teachers who want to provide examples to their students that they can go home and potentially see with their won eyes.

Science in the News

  • Here is a link to an interesting and fun story about competition between two squirrel species in the United Kingdom. The article is particularly relevant to the topic of population growth.

  • Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently jointly won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to raise awareness of the threat of climate change. This link is for a series of articles in the Washington Post that deal with the topic and how others are confronting our changing climate.

  • How can a "panel" win a Nobel Peace Prize? I thought that was reserved for a limited number of scientists.

    It does at first seem unusual that a "panel" might win the Nobel Peace Prize. However, according to the nomination criteria, the prize may be awarded to "persons or organizations that are in the process of resolving a conflict or creating peace". This year the award was presented jointly to an individual, Al Gore, and an organization, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the conflict being global warming.

  • Below are some links for articles relating to photosynthesis. The article published by BBC news is a little older but I wanted to include it as it contains some interesting and useful information.

    http://www.enn.com/ecosystems/article/23434
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3321819.stm

  • This first article is just for fun. It details how animals are being used to take pictures of some of the places in the world it is hard for humans to go and to video some of the wildlife behaviors rarely seen. Take a look at the National Geograpic video link on the left of the page too.

  • This next article is related to carbon cycling and how plankton might be used to remove some of the excess carbon dioxide causing global warming from the atmosphere.

  • Below are a few news stories I have selected that might be of interest.

    The first is more for fun and looks at an experiment involving cockroaches. It is an example of the unusual research and experiments people think up.

    The second is another story related to the issue of carbon cycling and the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as a result of Hurricane Katrina.

    The last relates to the topic of populations and the potential importance of abiotic factors in maintaining these populations.

  • This article from National Wildlife Magazine examines some of the adaptations the black-capped chickadee, a small bird seen in the northern half of the U.S., has to cold winter weather. The article relates directly to the training module on adaptations.

  • This article highlights how predator-prey relationships can be more complex than they at first appear.

  • An article for the New Year which talks about the near extinction of a bird known as the kiwi in New Zealand and the gradual recovery populations of the species are now making.

  • The web link below is for an article that discusses seeds and their formation which many of you may find useful. The website this article comes from covers many science topics you might be interested in learning more about.

    http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/s/seed.htm

  • This week an article related to genes, which we know can play a very important role in determining how a person looks and behaves. This article looks at how an individual's genes may affect their sleep patterns.

  • Scientists have made an interesting discovery regarding the nervous systems of naked mole rats which may prove useful in treating pain in humans. Take a look at the article that discusses this.

  • A couple of articles today that might be of interest.

    The first takes a look at how global warming may be causing spring to arrive earlier and the effects this might be having on plants and animlas, including humans.

    The next article discusses how gecko's are able to use their tails to save themselves from falling. A possible adaptation?

  • Today, a couple of articles to take a look at.

    The first examines the role bats play in controlling insect pests on plants, reducing the need for the use of pesticides.

    The second article is something completely different and looks at the ability of the eyes and brain to process change in something being looked at.