TPT WebSights column draft for April, 2009:

WebSights features announcements and reviews of select sites of interest to physics teachers. All sites are copyright by their authors. This column is available as a web page at http://PhysicsEd.BuffaloState.Edu/pubs/WebSights/.

If you have successfully used a physics website that you feel is outstanding and appropriate for WebSights, please email me the URL and describe how you use it to teach or learn physics. macisadl@buffalostate.edu.

More Summer 2009 Physics Teacher Professional Workshop announcements: The National Modeling Instruction Workshops for Summer 2009 have been announced at http://modeling.asu.edu/MW_nation.html . The ASU Modeling Physics network at http://modeling.asu.edu/ is the largest summer high school physics instructors network in the US, and over a dozen states offer several dozen modeling physics workshops of various lengths, with various financial arrangements – some pay teachers stipends to attend while others charge tuition and/or associated costs. High school physics teachers interested in their summer professional development are well-advised to start here.

Vision 101: How the eye works, visual correction and wearing contacts – http://www.1800contacts.com/StaticContent/Vision101/frames.html

A nice commercial site by the 1-800-CONTACTS company that animates the physics and anatomy of vision, with vision issues described at length in introductory language. Very well done.

Contributed by Diane Riendeau of Deerfield HS physics

Friction demonstrations with interleaved book pages

A Mythbusters video demonstrating the tremendous friction possible between the interleaved pages of two phone books has been getting a lot of attention on the teacher preparation electronic lists. The YouTube episode is found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOt-D_ee-JE and some teachers have replicated this effect (it makes a nice classroom experiment). Hint: Squeezing the air out of the interleaved pages makes a big difference.

Contributed by the editor and various posters to the AAPT ctp-l list; http://www.aapt.org/Membership/listservs.cfm

Convenient unit conversions using Google

Also on the electronic lists this past month, the use of the google search service for converting units has been garnering considerable comment. By opening a google search window at http://google.com and typing in phrases (without quotes) like 10 mph in m/s, 50 mph in km/sec and 1000 watt hours in btu, one readily obtains appropriate conversions. Posters to phys-l have pointed out that this service is a part of a larger and more robust service called Google Calculator, that the converter is fussy about hyphens and that the service won't convert if inappropriate units are specified. The service also seems ignorant of dB and pH units.

Contributed by phys-l posters, https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/

2009 is International Year of Astronomy

To celebrate 400^th anniversary of Galileo's promulgation of the use of telescopes in astronomy, UNESCO and the IAU have declared 2009 to be the international year of astronomy. While many events are planned internationally, the main website is http://www.astronomy2009.org/ . On a related note, the freely available online journal for astronomy educators the Astronomy Education Review has recently released a new edition and has become a member of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) journals. http://aer.noao.edu/ . If you teach astronomy at any level this journal is worth a look.

Doing What Works: http://dww.ed.gov

The US Department of Education has established a multimedia (video and text annotated and/or narrated slide shows) driven website called Doing What Works collecting "research based practices" and proffers very concrete and practical advice for teaching various subjects and disciplines. The guided tour is helpful, as is the significant How To Organize Your Teaching section under Psychology of Learning. The site seems particularly well-suited for new teachers. Doing What Works seems to be very friendly, supporting and approachable website for teachers with many tips for teaching mathematics (always a physics teachers' task) and classroom management, though not with physics-specific resources as of yet.