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This has been one of my pet peeves for a while, and my kids can already point out the things I'm going to whine about as we drive along the BQE (Brooklyn-Queens Expressway) coming home from Queens.  There are several of these video billboards along the road.  I have always found it ironic that there are laws dealing with "distracted driving" when the driver does something to distract himself, but nothing about allowing third-parties to deliberately try to distract the driver.  I mean, what else does any billboard do but try to draw attention to itself. 

Okay, that's a mouthful.  I first read about this a month ago and put it on my list of things to look into.  What I was hoping for was something that might be applicable for participation by middle school students.  NALTA is a cosmic-ray detection experiment which requires fairly simple equipment which is placed on the school roof and is largely (completely?) maintenance free. 

The New Horizons spacecraft on it's way to Pluto was scheduled to get a wake-up call on November 9 and then spend 10 days running system tests and diagnostics.  The trip to Pluto is so long (in spite of the craft's record speed of about 23 km/sec) that it spends much of its time in hibernation mode.  It's schedule to arrive at Pluton in 2015.  Today it crosses the 15 AU mark (that's 15 times as far from the Sun as the Earth is).

According to a Twitter post, the craft is now away and operating.  Hopefully, we'll get an update soon on PlutoToday.com. Unfortunately, for all us eager to hear news of Pluto, well, we'll just have to wait.  Space is, alas, mostly space with not much to see.

Okay, the rings themselves haven't changed at all.  But it turns out that there is an outer dust ring that is about 24 million kilometers in diameter composed of dust grains that do not reflect visible light.  Because of that, it hasn't been seen before.  NASA has a short (very short) press release showing an artist's conception of what the ring looks like in infrared that helps you get a sense of scale.  But even that is hard.  For comparison, the distance from the Sun to the Earth is a

Here's a project in need of (part-time) volunteers.  Classifying galaxies.  Yep, you too can become a galactic zoologist!  You can find a short teaser on the Astronomy Picture of the Day web site (APOD Oct 26, 2009) with more details at the official Galaxy Zoo web site.  Makes a good family game with older kids, too.  How would you classify that galaxy?

Another generic resource, also from the NSTA elementary mailing list.  The issue of using inquiry in science lessons is a big deal and also came up a recent School Leadership Team meeting.  Inquiry does, of course, get used, but it's always a tough item since it is easy to get "off script" when using a lesson plan that allows student-driven inquiry.  At the same time, it's hard to really teach science without it.  The issue in NYC, and probably many other places, is that since the city has instituted standardized science testing, the test is naturally content based.