by: Thomas R. Tretter and M. Gail Jones
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Type Journal ArticlePub Date 1/1/2003Stock # tst03_070_01_22Volume 070Issue 01
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Freefalling: What’s size got to do with it?
Helping high school students understand the scaling effects of something being larger or smaller is a unifying theme that transects all of the science disciplines. How does an ant elude inj... See More
Helping high school students understand the scaling effects of something being larger or smaller is a unifying theme that transects all of the science disciplines. How does an ant elude injury when falling from the top of a skyscraper? Students need to consider the ant’s small mass in order to understand how air resistance can break its fall, allowing it to escape an otherwise certain death. The authors provide several examples of how to help high school students consider the effects of scale on systems and organisms. An activity is provided that helps students visualize the order and magnitude of numbers. Index cards are clipped to a clothesline to model powers of 10 notation. The authors include excellent examples for teaching certain biology and physical science concepts, and a website that highlights the distances between various powers of ten is referenced. Students can travel a billion light years away from Earth or be transported back to inside a carbon atom with a click of the computer mouse. Logarithmic scales are also mentioned.
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