Friday, February 24, 2012

India Rising



Check out the latest issue of science for an exclusive interview with the Indian Prime Minister, Dr. Singh. (Click here for the interview and here news focus.)
What really captured my attention was this statement of his:
"unless one is optimistic, one is overwhelmed by the dimension of the development task that we have to accomplish"
 And check out what he has to say on the nuclear energy issue as well! 

Friday, February 10, 2012

Mathemagic



Fear gripped the bones during Math classes in the primary/high school. Algebra and Muliplication tables - Oh Man! How do we remember all those formula and numbers? But there seems to be new and easy ways of understanding/learning these! Check out the videos below.



Thursday, February 09, 2012

Longest Straw



Am sure each one of us wrote this definition for 2 marks in one of our examinations:


The movement of a liquid along the surface of a solid caused by the attraction of molecules of the liquid to the molecules of the solid is called capillary action.
(Am sure many of us used solid and liquid interchangeably.)

Honestly, how many of us were able to fully grasp the importance of this phenomena? There of course were several examples cited in the text book and some of them that I recall are oil rising in the wick, drying towels, transpiration in plans. Although these examples were supposed to enhance our understanding, the million dollar question is whether it enhanced understanding or increased the burden of memorising.

When I came across the below video, I could immediately understand and appreciate what a capillary force is...and all the examples I memorized made sense! So, what is the difference? Why couldn't I grasp and appreciate capillarity from the book as much as I did after watching the video? The primary reason, I think, is because here (video) they have used a practical day-to-day activity to explain the concept. Further, the practical way of explaining, that is showing it "in action" further interests and keeps the mind involved unlike the bookish texts.

Let us think and create more such videos!