Category Archives: Music
Symphony of Science – Quantum World
This Symphony of Science song is one of my favourites, which ties loosely to our new Grade 9 unit on Atoms.
Related to it is an update to the Powers of Ten video, from the IMAX Cosmic Voyage movie, narrated by Morgan Freeman. the start brings us in powers of ten, out into the universe. From 6:03, we start moving in – to cells, molecules and atoms.
Jump straight to the small bits here (6:03). Biology class will use it too, as we look into measurement and microscopy.
This is why we love Science.
The Symphony of Science
Thanks to Bing (the encyclopedic student, not the search engine) for showing me this. The perfect post-exam chillout!
The Symphony of Science is a musical project headed by John Boswell, designed to deliver scientific knowledge and philosophy in musical form.
It mashes TED Talks, Carl Sagan and autotune into quite the experience. Let The Ode to the Brain mess with your grey matter:
The Biology Song & Lyrical Science
I love this song. “There are seven things it needs to survive”:
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Inspired by the Stanford biologists, I’m looking for popular songs to butcher into biological themes. The process of taking one of your favourite songs and twisting it into a factually-sound academic re-write can be a great way to consolidate key concepts, especially for the musically intelligent. It takes more than just recall of the facts – you have to force yourself to understand the topic in order to write a decent song. To make the song make sense, you need a good grasp of the content and you must use the key terms correctly.
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Ideas so far –
- An IB Biology version of “Apoptize” (One Republic’s ‘Apologize‘) (completed – click here)
- “One Gene, One Protein“, after “No Woman, No Cry“
- “Don’t Divide Even“, after The Script’s “Break Even” (completed – click here)
- “I Will Divide,” after Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” (have a go – click here)
- “ACE, ACE Inhibitors“, based on Vanilla Ice’s “Ice, Ice Baby“
- Endangered Species song for “Numb/Encore” by LP and Jay-Z
- “Hormones“, after Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours“
- “Good Riddance (to excess end products)“, based on Green Day’s “Good Riddance (Time of Your life)” (completed – click here)
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For some more reading on how making use of Musical Intelligence can aid in learning across the curriculum:
- “The Effect of Music on Second Language Vocab Acquisition” from ESL Through Music
- “Promoting Literacy Through Music” from Songs for Teaching (Resources here: Science page)
- “Singing In Science: Writing and Recording Student Lyrics to Express Learning” from the University of California. Here’s Tomcfad demonstrating this technique with an elementary earth science class:
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My big question: Has there been any research on the effectiveness of different styles of music in relation to age group, cultural background or musical preference?
Many of the bought-resources seem to based on country songs or old songs – how well does that translate to a modern teen audience in an international or urban setting?
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If you’ve got any cool ideas (the more complex, the better), or any comments on the use of music as a learning tool, please post them below!
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Headphones image from: http://blog.timesunion.com/capitol/archives/date/2008/page/5/
Periodic Table for Biologists
Shortlink to this page: http://is.gd/iBiologyPTable
Click on this link to go to the periodic table page and download the A0 poster: http://is.gd/iBiologyPTable
Biotech: The Musical (re-up)
Science + music + YouTube = awesome.
Here are some comedy highlights:
Bio-Rad are the leaders when it comes to making silly music videos to promote their products. The classic ‘PCR Song‘ is great for the Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology topic:
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And you’ve got to love their follow up, GTCA So Fast – touting enzyme supermixes for the PCR process – this would fit in the DNA Replication section:
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Mass Spec-tacular for the chemists (Reach that Peak):
More musical mayhem after the jump…
“Girl, It’s Time to Automate” & “The PCR Song”
This was first posted by TheIntersection over at ScienceBlogs.
It seems the latest way to market expensive Science lab toys (by which I mean equipment beyond the reach of your average school), is to produce a cheesy pop video.
Our first example is clearly aimed at the ladies in the lab and has been produced by Eppendorf to sell their automated pipetting system:
The next makes a mockery of cheesy ensemble charity singles and has been made by BioRad to market their PCR equipment:
“I’s amazing what heating and cooling and heating can do-oooo!”
More choice lyrics after the jump.
Queen – Say It’s Not True
This one passed me by, being out of the country, but I found out more when I read that Queen were writing a new album and going on tour.
Why is this important?
Well, it’s Queen and it’s a HIV campaign video for a start. And we all know two things:
1. You can’t be a proper scientist if you don’t like Queen.
2. Erm… that’s it.
Let’s also not forget that not many geek-books come with their own trailers…
i-Biology 