Amazing Kids, Growth Mindset Research, and Social Justice

Frank Noschese just retweeted an amazing video of kids playing on a rotational motion apparatus.


In other news...

A thorough and definitive meta-analysis of growth mindset research [paywall] was published this month [sci-hub]. They find a weak (but significant) correlation between mindset and achievement, and that mindset-focused interventions have a small overall effect.

In the USA, many students participated in a walk-out to protest government inaction to prevent school shootings. This New York Times article discusses why participation in political activism can be beneficial for teenagers.

There has been a debate this week about social media outreach by scientists. At the heart is this comment in Science, which refers to PhD student and Instagram star Samantha Yammine.

This summer, Lisbon is hosting the International Physics Olympiad. The old problems (and solutions) are available online, and make for interesting reading.

Mark Lattery is running an online Modeling Instruction course this summer focused on modern physics. Sounds pretty interesting! Another good resource for modern physics is the Perimeter Institute.

I have enjoyed reading Moses Rifkin's reflections from the NSTA meeting this past week. It's great to see that more people are talking about and engaging with social justice as a element of science education. This was his talk.

This week's #iteachphysics chat about the physics teacher shortage was a good one, although unfortunately I didn't see any magic solutions.

Stephen Hawking passed away this week. I've noticed that a generation of physicists, who would have been in middle or high school during the years after A Brief History of Time was published and are thus in their 30s today, often credit the book for their interest in the field.

Seen on the web:
Erkan Polatdemir shared this video of braking as a magnet passes near a conductor (and a toy pig).
A few people have reminded us of Walter Fendt's great collection of physics simulations.
Meagan Downing has been sharing practicals, including this diffraction activity.
This video made the rounds, seemingly showing a girl's hair reacting to standing sound waves.
Justin Aion has a great twitter-chain about advice for new teachers.
Maxine Willis reminded me about the excellent Interactive Video Vignettes.