Teachers Using Everyday Objects to Teach

It's always good to get a some good press for the local teachers and organizers of one of our ASM summer teacher camps. It's not always as much fun to be asked to explain the camp to reporters in a few soundbites.

Todd, however, did a nice job when the Meridian press stopped by on Friday during the June 2013 teachers camp at Meridian High School in Meridian, MS to put together the above report, interviewing one camper and one master teacher and showing the campers measuring Young's modulus on composite day.

In a neat turn, the camp didn't have any spot plates for the bismuth-tin alloy lab (to demonstrate the eutectic point). The master teachers improvised and finally landed on the solution shown at 1:00 in the video: plaster of Paris molds using Whoppers for the forms. According to Caryn Jackson, they first tried glass beads (like those found in a Pente game) and grapes before settling on the Whoppers. Apparently the Whoppers also had the benefit of leaving a little wax/chocolate coating behind that seemed to ease the spots' journey out of the molds.

Nice save, Todd, Tom, and Caryn.