Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 23, 2008
An offshoot of Joules’ Law is that when transmitting electrical power, the current is kept as low as possible in order to reduce energy losses associated with heat of the electrical cables. Because the power being transferred is the product of the voltage and the current, we can still get the same power transferred if [...]
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 13, 2008
Tom Healy teaches Physics in Cabinteely Community School and for quite a while now has been uploading revision videos on Leaving Cert Physics to youtube. He has almost 50 up there by now and has divided them into Mandatory and Non-mandatory experiments. A wonderful way to revise, but also a wonderful resource for any new teachers. [...]
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 12, 2008
Jerome Devitt (History Teacher) runs a transition-year module on Light and Sound for theatres, and kindly agreed to allow us in to watch him teach one of his lessons. Not all of it comes out great on video, but it should still prove very usefull for Senior Phyics classes. If you would like to play [...]
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 9, 2008
This is never going to go viral like the LHC rap, but I thought it was pretty cool. Both the history and the science are spot on, it’s just a pity that there’s a 40 second intro. Who has this amount of time to spare?
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 6, 2008
The single greatest resource I have access to in my profession is the Institute of Physics’ (IOP) discussion forum. Any query I have ever had has been satisfactorily answered. It works because it has a large critical mass, although like most forums most members are happy to just read, which is fine too. I imagine [...]
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 5, 2008
Words fail me. Reminds me of the old Dihydrogen Monoxide hoax.
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 3, 2008
We have Open Day coming up and I was considering using the bed of nails. It’s certainly impressive, but I think we may not have enough room or time on the day. It’s pretty cool though. And the nice thing about it is that the more nails you have on it per unit area, the [...]
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 2, 2008
I have been having a bit of trouble (fun?) trying to get across some concepts associated with centripetal motion. This is at least partly because I don’t understand it myself. It appears I’m not alone. xkcd is a wonderful site for cartoons like this.
Posted by: ozymandias1 on: October 1, 2008
My friend Dee Maguire reminded me recently of some very useful videos on teachers tv of physics teacher David Robinson in action. Some of these are also on youtube: The magnetic gun is also referred to as a ‘Gaussian gun’. We had a bit of fun puting a basic one together at the end of class the [...]