The Kid Should See This.
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There's just so much science, nature, music, art, technology, storytelling and assorted good stuff out there that my kids (and maybe your kids) haven't seen. It's most likely not stuff that was made for them...
But we don't underestimate kids around here.
Kid-friendly not-made-for-kids videos for all! Collected by Rion Nakaya and her three four year old co-curator.
Tip Jar: Curating this blog takes work! If you like the videos on this site, please support the science education projects that we've picked on DonorsChoose.org.
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From the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Measuring the Universe! So how exactly do we measure things that are incredibly far away? Positioning over time, light, and math, math, math! This video contains a lot of information — even about sound waves and color shifts in light — but it’s such a great start to understanding how we see and measure what’s out beyond our Earth and our galaxy. And it demonstrates how important math and patience are in science!
via The Awesomer.
The moon is 1.3 light seconds away. The sun is 8 light minutes away. The store is 10 bike minutes from the house. And Sydney is 7 humpback whale months from LA. Wow! How Far is a Second? by Minute Physics.
What is a year? It’s a question I get asked a fair amount around here… What’s a year? How many days until Saturday? How many minutes in an hour? How long until I can play games on your iPhone? But I digress…
Minute Physics explains what a year is. And if you and your kid(s) want more calendar mathematics after that, then follow it up with this explanation about leap year!
via Gizmodo.
One of the most famous surfaces in mathematics, the Möbius strip can be constructed by cutting a long strip of paper, putting a half twist in it, and gluing the ends of the strip together. What makes this seemingly ordinary construct so fascinating is that, while the original strip of paper clearly had two sides, the Möbius strip seems to have only one. Try to draw a line on both “sides” without picking up your pencil. It’s actually quite simple.
Then you take some scissors to it… and it gets even more interesting!
via ScienceDump.
Parabolas (etc.) from Radiolab, which has the co-curator running around looking for parabolas everywhere we go.
“A video inspired by the mathematician, Steve Strogatz. At the age of thirteen, Steve was astonished to find that pendulums and water fountains had a strange relationship that had previously been completely hidden from him.”
It was pointed out in some comments on vimeo that many of the shapes in the video are not parabolas but are actually catenaries. Since I won’t explain it best, you can check out more on parabolas vs catenaries next!
Thanks, @mindfulmimi
A series of visual examples from the book How Round Is Your Circle: “John Bryant and Chris Sangwin illustrate how physical models are created from abstract mathematical ones.”
We liked watching all of these, but Dudeney’s Dissection — cutting an equilateral triangle into pieces which can be rearranged into a square via well-placed hinges — is definitely the co-curator’s and my favorite.
Math FTW!
Powers of Ten (1968), written and directed by Charles and Ray Eames. How is it that I didn’t see this classic film until I was in college? It’s perfect for kids! They should see this!
Thanks, Ariel Churi.
A Sesame Street classic: Circle to square to triangle to rectangle… but don’t stop there!
