Road Scholars on an Eduvacation!
Yes, we're moving on again, but this time like we mean it. In an RV.

Friday, August 15, 2008

Swooning Over Scientists

Lots of people have favorite musicians or actors. . .does anyone else have a favorite scientist? I get about as excited about some of my favorite scientists and naturalists as some people do about other celebrities. So here's my very favorite, geologist Iain Stewart:





He explains a lot of human cultural history in terms of geology, such as how geology has shaped fine art through the ages. Some of his perspectives were so eye-opening and exciting the first time I heard them, and he explains basic geological (and other scientific) concepts in such easy-to-understand terms (much of the time using food to illustrate, lol) that even children have no problem assimilating the information. If I had to make one science recommendation for other homeschoolers, this would be it. He's just all-around awesome, and plus he has an excellent Scottish accent. ;) So if you have Tivo (or whatever), search for "Hot Rocks" (there are 9 different episodes) and "Earth: The Biography" (5 episodes, also available on DVD). Those are the US titles, BTW - in the UK they are named differently.

And my favorite astrophysicist (come on, everyone has one of those, right??) is Neil deGrasse Tyson, host of Nova Science NOW as well as frequent guest on the Colbert Report (so you know he's a cool guy!)

Click here to can catch up on Nova Science NOW if you've missed it this summer. You can watch various segments from the show there, and again, not only is there some great information and sometimes a new perspective to be had, everything is explained so easily that the whole family can learn together.

That's all from Geek-ville today! :)


3 comments:

Nydia said...

Of course I don1t know these two, but we have a amazing astrophysicist, Marcelo Gleiser (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcelo_Gleiser), who made a serie about space in Brazil that's awesome. He's very wise and cool with his coloquial language to explain the mysteries of Universe, specially when kids are watching.
Einstein is an obssession to me since I was a kid. I have many biographies from different athors and some of his own books as well. There's a weird and fascinating (well at least for me, einstein fan) book by Carolyn Abraham, called "Possessing Genius: The True Account of the Bizarre Odyssey of Einstein's Brain", that drop my jaw.

Kelli said...

I'm so glad to hear that you are another science-lover, Nydia! Another reason to love you truly.
XOXOXO
:)

Nydia said...

The funny thing is that my post today at my blog was also about science... but sci-fi!