28 APR 2015 by ideonexus
Standing Desks Improve Student Engagement
The research looked at the results of an experiment in which 282 participants in grades 2-4 were observed in the fall and spring during one school year. Student engagement was monitored by actions such as answering a question, raising a hand, or participating in discussion, while off-task behaviors included talking out of turn.
Engagement of the "treatment" classrooms was compared with the engagement of "control" classrooms. The researchers noted that both groups showed "general increases in... 1 
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notes07 MAR 2015 by ideonexus
Questioning Air Pollution
How should a living organism live?
When spring arrives, you open your doors, the wind blows in. The smell of flowers fills the airand colors come back to lifeSometimes when it rains or when it’s foggy out. You can’t help but breathe the air deep into your lungs and experience the feeling of small water droplets filling them up. Both piercingly cold but also pure and fresh.
In autumn, you would spend a whole afternoon with a loved one doing absolutely nothing, basking lazily in the sun.... 1 notes
notes05 MAR 2015 by ideonexus
Science Recovers from the Chinese Cultural Revolution
Leaving the mountains, Ye felt spring was everywhere. The cold winter of the Cultural Revolution really was over, and everything was springing back to life. Even though the calamity had just ended, everything was in ruins, and countless men and women were licking their wounds. The dawn of a new life was already evident. Students with children of their own appeared on college campuses; bookstores sold out of famous literary works; technological innovation became the focus in factories; and sci... 1 notes
notes13 MAR 2014 by ideonexus
Giordano Bruno Observations of the Sun
The meaning is the more excellence, as it is the less vulgar, and you will see that it is single, unified, and not strained. You must consider that although the sun appears different with respect to different regions of the earth according to time and place, nevertheless with respect to the entire globe it acts always and everywhere in the same way, for in whatever point of the ecliptic it may find itself, it causes winter, summer, autumn, and spring, and the entire earthly globe receives the... 1 notes
notes...and it's effects on the Earth.
30 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
We Should Think of Ourselves as Atoms
we should consider ourselves but as atoms of organized matter, whose pleasure or whose pain, whose existence in a state of organization, or whose non-existence in that state, is a matter of no importance in the laws and operations of Nature; we should view ourselves with the same feelings, as we view the leaf which rises in the spring, and falls in the autumn, and then serves no further purpose but to fertilize the earth for a fresh production; we should view ourselves but as the blossoms of ... 1 notes
notesWe are like the leaves on trees that are green for a season and then return to the Earth.
06 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
The Teacher Who Inspired Thomas Jefferson
In the spring of 1760, [I] went to William and Mary college, where I continued two years. It was my great good fortune, and what probably fixed the destinies of my life, that Dr. William Small of Scotland, was then Professor of Mathematics, a man profound in most of the useful branches of science, with a happy talent of communication, correct and gentlemanly manners, and an enlarged and liberal mind. He, most happily for me, became soon attached to me, and made me his daily companion when not... 1 notes
notesFrom his personal account.
22 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
Save Species to Eat Them
The creativity behind social marketing can be alarming. A recent television ad depicted water disappearing into a storm drain as a voice warned that lawn fertilizer in the spring can wind up in the Chesapeake Bay. "No crab should die like this," the announcer opines. Later, the announcer appears on screen with a small tub in hand, exclaiming "they should perish in some hot, tasty melted butter!" This promotion by the Chesapeake Bay Program, a subsidiary of the U.S. Environmental Protection Ag... 1 notes
notesA different way to reach people concerning endangered species is to point out they will no longer be available as lunch.
01 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
A Clock Stopped at the Moment Feynman's Wife Died
Sometimes we can actually pin down the explanation of a weird coincidence. A great American scientist called Richard Feynman tragically lost his wife to cancer, and the clock in her room stopped at precisely the moment she died. Goose-pimples! But Dr Feynman was not a great scientist for nothing. He worked out the true explanation. The clock was faulty. If you picked it up and tilted it, it tended to stop. When Mrs Feynman died, the nurse needed to record tl the time for the official death ce... 1 notes
notesBut he traced the phenomenon to a faulty mechanism in the clock that triggered when the nurse picked it up to record the time of death.
12 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
The Perpetual Renewal That Comes From the Natural World
Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Whatever the vexations or concerns of their personal lives, their thoughts can find paths that lead to inner contentment and to renewed excitement in living. Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of the birds, the ebb and flow of the tides, ... 1 notes
notesThose who enjoy its endless mysteries are never at a loss of interest in life.
08 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
Spring Recapitulates Evolution
Spring provides a kind of annual recapitulation of the evolution of life on Earth, an opportunity to celebrate anew the greening of the planet three and a half billion years ago by the first photosynthesizing bacteria. All life—the whole glorious parade along the path—depends upon the photosynthesizers. As spring dresses the deciduous woodlands in its Easter best, the nonphotosynthesizers get moving too. Suddenly the woods are skittering, fluttering, munching. singing. From rock-hard seed... 1 notes
notesFirst the leaves come back, photosynthesizing to produce the energy the animals will consume for life as well.
