Halloween Science and the Ellen DeGeneres Show seem to go hand in hand. I was excited to get the call from Ellen’s producers last week with an invite to be a guest on her ever-popular Halloween Show. We’ve practiced and practiced our new demos for the show (no, we can’t spill the beans right now), and I think we’ll have a few surprises for her and the studio audience. Of course, everyone tunes in to see Ellen’s costume. My only hope is that it’s not flammable… and that’s all I can say.
Find out when the Ellen DeGeneres Show is on in your area.
There is a big fight gearing up in Colorado over three ballot initiatives – 60, 61 and 101. The initiatives promise tax cuts, controlled spending and borrowing and drops car registration taxes. The initiatives sound like a great idea, until you look closer at what they will do to Colorado and our public schools.
Amendment 60 will change Colorado’s constitution. It will cut property tax rates and allow voters to challenge the government to lower their property taxes. It will require the state to replace K-12 education funding each year and will overturn previously agreed to mill levy increases. It will require the state to replace the education funding, but does not give a allocation of where the funding will come from. Amendment 60 will cut local support for schools in half.
Amendment 61 will also change Colorado’s constitution by stopping the state from taking on debt in the form of loans. All projects, including building and improving schools, roads, bridges, etc would have to be financed by the public at the time it was being improved or built.
Proposition 101 will change state law to lower state income
We’re excited to announce the official release of our enhanced ebook for Naked Eggs and Flying Potatoes: Unforgettable Experiments That Make Science Fun. The print version of the book (Greenleaf Book Group) is available in book stores throughout the country, and the enhanced ebook version is available through the iTunes Store. While there’s nothing new about ebooks per se, the notion of an enhanced ebook is very new. In fact, it’s so new that our scientifically enhanced version of Naked Eggs and Flying Potatoes is officially the 75th enhanced ebook title ever published. In just a few months, the previous statement will seem so insignificant because there will be hundreds, if not thousands, of titles that flood the market.
Visit the iTunes Store through your iBooks application and search for “Naked Eggs and Flying Potatoes”.
What’s the difference between an ebook and an enhanced ebook?
We think of an ebook as a simple conversion of the written word to a generic electronic reader (Kindle or a Nook, for example). The
Doing science demonstrations on the radio can be a little challenging because… well… because listeners can’t see what’s going on in the studio. But the challenge to come up with audible science is too cool to pass up, and that’s why I enjoy going back to the Mix 100 Morning Show with Dom and Jane. We were fortunate enough to land on a day when the Dom and Jane had a studio audience. You’ll see from the pictures below that they were all involved in making screaming balloons, touching 50,000 volts of electricity and watching Tizzy walk on glass. All perfectly normal stuff when you’re in the Mix studios.
On October 7th, 2010, teachers, politicians, celebrities, authors, firefighters and people across America will join children to read a book. Read for the Record is a record-breaking campaign that brings adults and children together on the same day to read the same book.
This year’s book is The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats. It is the story of a little boy who wakes up to find snow has fallen overnight. He goes on simple adventures in the snow, like knocking snow from a tree, examining his snowy footprints, creating snow angels and trying to save a snowball for the next day.
Jumpstart’s Read for the Record began in 2006 and over the past five years, America has joined in, reading classic stories such as The Little Engine That Could (2006), The Story of Ferdinand (2007), and Corduroy (2008). Last year, records were shattered when Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar was read aloud to children worldwide! 2,019,752 children joined together and shared
