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Public: Education: Motivation
science by music   (+3, -3)  [vote for, against]
teaching science by means of music

for many students, science is difficult. putting concepts to well known melodies makes them much easier to remember.
-- Malakh, Apr 22 2000

Schoolhouse Rock http://genxtvland.s...Rock/index-lo.shtml
American Broadcasting Corporation's series [jutta, Apr 22 2000]

Tom Lehrer http://www.wiw.org/~drz/tom.lehrer/
Some of Tom Lehrer's work falls into the same category, probably most famously so the "element song". He himself, however, seems to agree with [baf]. Q: "Mr Lehrer, I thought it might interest you to know that because of your "the element song", I got a higher grade in my chemistry class this year." A: "Congratulations, but I hope you learned a little actual chemistry too." [jutta, Apr 22 2000]

Michael Offutt: A Mole Is a Unit http://www.benlogan...e/chemistr/mole.htm
(Thanks, nick_n_uit!) Songs of this author have been published as the Chemistry Songbag I & II (order through Flinn Scientific) and at least one Science Songbag (out of print). [jutta, Apr 22 2000]

Science is not simply a collection of facts! To actually learn science is to learn observation and critical thinking - not to memorize the things scientists have figured out, but to learn how they figured them out, and how to figure them out yourself. Better mnemonics would only encourage the most anti-scientific aspect of science education: the tendency to tell rather than show.
-- baf, Apr 22 2000


I agree with [baf] but sometimes memorization is neccesary... those are the cases in which songs are useful.
-- Malakh, Apr 24 2000


The Sun is a mass Of incandescent gas; A gigantic nuclear FUR-nace!

Where hydrogen is burned Into He-Lee-Um At temperatures of millions of degrees!
-- hawkinsdale, Apr 25 2000


The sun is hot, The sun is not A place where we could live. But here on Earth there'd be no life without the light it gives!!
-- Malakh, Apr 25 2000


It's a long way from Amphiloxus; it's a long way to us;
It's a long way from Amphiloxus to the meanest human cuss!!
Goodbye notochord and gill-slits, Helll-o lungs and brains!
It's a long, long way from Amphiloxus
But that's from whence we came.
-- hello_c, Sep 08 2000


baf and malakh both have valid points. I'm studying information technology and have found some mnemonics useful, but in the end you have to think for yourself. Let's just hope music does more for science than it did for history in Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire"!
-- BobStCul, Oct 18 2000


The sun, it burns up in the sky, Far higher than the birds can fly, The moon, it orbits about the earth, And makes the tide of the sea we surf, An eclipse is when they come between, And one of them can no longer be seen, The stars, each one is another sun, Ours is just the closest one.
-- Brog, Nov 01 2000


My old science teacher did this. She had a group that would write anatomy parodies on bands like SR71
-- beretboy, Nov 09 2000


What about science limericks?

There once was a star called the Sun
Whose heat was produced from fusion
It was jolly hot
And after a lot
of time it ended up a big blob of Helium
-- hippo, Nov 09 2000


I don't like the idea of making subjects "fun." People really learn these things by "getting into" them. People use mnemonics to do well on tests, whereafter they promptly forget the material.

Byron and Shelley learned Greek in the 19th century and read the Illiad and Odyssey in the ancient idiom. Think about it.
-- Vance, Jan 29 2001


a mole is a unit, or have you heard
meaning six times ten to the twenty-third
that's six with twenty-three zeros at the end
much to large a number to comprehend
i wish i knew who actually came up with htis, if for no other reason that to ward off potential copyright infringement stuff.
-- nick_n_uit, Apr 08 2001


The song is (c) 1988 by Michael Offutt, published in his "Chemistry Songbag". According to one webpage, he's on the net at <moffutt@aol.com>; the Chemistry Songbag is available from Flinn Scientific.
-- jutta, Apr 08 2001


Isn't music is just a bunch of wavelengths that are picked up by our ear? Melodies are science.
-- candide, Jan 24 2002


Johnny used to drink alot, But now he drinks no more; For what he thought was H2O was H2SO4.
-- QuadAlpha, Jan 25 2002


There was a young lady called Bright; Who's speed was far faster than light; She set off one day, in a relative way; And returned the previous night. (Making Grade 12 physics students do 8000 word essays on relativity does terrible things to the young mind)
-- QuadAlpha, Jan 25 2002


Twinkle Twinkle little star,I don't wonder what you are; For by spectroscopic ken, I know that you're hydrogen; Twinkle Twinkle little star, I don't wonder what you are.
-- QuadAlpha, Jan 25 2002


A Mathematician confided; That a mobius band is one sided; You'll get quite a laugh, If you cut it in half; For it stays in one piece when divided;
-- QuadAlpha, Jan 25 2002



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