Welcome to the winter issue of EduNews. We've been experiencing a drought here in Northern California and hoping for more rain. However, there is no drought of resources for you to use in your teaching and learning.

Contents

1 - GEOMETRY PLAYGROUND PATHWAYS
2 - EXPLORATORIUM AT NSTA
3 - LEARNING SCIENCE IN INFORMAL ENVIRONMENTS
4 - WIN AN IPOD FOR YOUR FEEDBACK
5 - EXPLORATORIUM LEARNING COMMONS TIP: BELONG TO A GOOGLE OR YAHOO GROUP?

1 - GEOMETRY PLAYGROUND PATHWAYS
http://www.exploratorium.edu/pathways/guided/index.html
The Exploratorium is developing a new mathematics exhibition called Geometry Playground. During each of the three years of this project, we will be producing a third of the exhibition. A set of classroom activities, or Pathways, will accompany each year's exhibits.

Each Pathway contains activities to do before, during, and after a field trip to the Geometry Playground exhibit. The Pathways are designed for three different grade spans: K-2, 3-5, and 6-8.

Geometry Playground is funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

2 - EXPLORATORIUM AT NSTA
The Exploratorium invites you to visit our Exhibit Hall booth and meet us at the annual NSTA conference in New Orleans, LA, March 18-21, Booth 833. Our entertaining Teacher Institute staff will be sharing and demonstrating cool activities you can use in the classroom and at home, using simple, inexpensive materials. Extended Learning Group staff will show free online resources from the Exploratorium Web site. We will be introducing a new collection of downloadable images, video, audio, and text from the Exploratorium's award-winning polar education Web site, Ice Stories. The earth's polar regions represent the canary-in-a-coal mine for climate change. Come learn about the latest research and see media resources produced by scientists who work in the Arctic and Antarctic.

3 - LEARNING SCIENCE IN INFORMAL ENVIRONMENTS
http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12190
The National Research Council just released a report called Learning Science in Informal Environments. It is an invaluable guide for program and exhibit designers, evaluators, staff of science-rich informal learning institutions and community-based organizations, scientists interested in educational outreach, federal science agency education staff, and K-12 science educators.

4 - WIN AN IPOD FOR YOUR FEEDBACK
http://www.exploratorium.edu/imaging_station/
The Microscope Imaging Station is looking for educators to evaluate this Web site that has still images, videos, articles, classroom activities, and other educational resources based on research-grade light microscope images. Review the Web site and take the online survey to win a chance for an iPod.

5 - EXPLORATORIUM LEARNING COMMONS TIP: BELONG TO A GOOGLE OR YAHOO GROUP?
Did you know that both track group members? If you'd like to protect your privacy, you can easily do this and still be a group member.

Note that your ability to opt-out is not user-specific. It is MACHINE specific. That means you will have to opt-out on every computer (and browser) you use.

Yahoo
Yahoo is now using "Web beacons" to track every Yahoo Group user. This is similar to using cookies but allows Yahoo to record every Web site and every group you visit, even when you're not connected to Yahoo.

Look at their updated privacy statement regarding "relevant advertising" at http://info.yahoo.com/privacy/us/yahoo/

Here's the link for removing the Web beacons: http://privacy.yahoo.com/privacy/us/beacons/details.html

Google
Look at their updated privacy at http://www.google.com/privacypolicy.html

And opt-out at http://www.google.com/privacy_ads.html