As the presidential election of 2012 draws closer, Americans will witness a resurgence of references to the Electoral College in news reports. Here, "Looking at the Law" hopes to demystify the Electoral College, and refresh many social studies memories--just in time for the next election--with some frequently asked questions about electing the…

Because in his Gettysburg Address, President Abraham Lincoln said, "we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain," and "...that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth," it is accurate to report that he spoke the words "perish from the earth" and "died in vain." But if his 1864…

The American public can count on a few things during the presidential election season. First, candidates will take a moral high ground and forswear mudslinging. Before long however, they will proceed to engage in nasty accusations against their opponents. A vibrant democracy ought to welcome carefully thought-out views that, when intentionally…

Over the last 20 years, independent filmmakers have produced insightful documentaries of high profile political campaigns with behind-the-scenes footage. These documentaries offer inside looks and unique perspectives on electoral politics. This campaign season, consider "The War Room"; "A Perfect Candidate"; "Journeys With George;" "Chisholm '72";…

Many readers may recall that this author wrote an open letter to President Obama in 2010 where he took issue with the emphasis on math and science education resulting in the marginalization of social studies and citizenship. In this column, he has selected and written about websites that focus on the election process. The author hopes this will…

This article presents what the authors consider to be the ten top websites for teaching about issues in the election season. These include: (1) The Annenberg Political Fact Check--a non-partisan organization that assesses the accuracy of candidates' information in ads, speeches, and debates; (2) The Living Room Candidate: Presidential Ads…

Improving elections will be neither easy nor inexpensive. States need to make elections administration a top priority--updating systems and eliminating errors, doing more to register citizens, making voting convenient, and promoting information on registration and the voting process. Surely it is worth it. The legitimacy of the system of voting is…

In curricula that encourages philosophy as having an integral role in educational programs, students get the opportunity to wonder and speculate, in a natural state surrounded by questions. A. K. Salmon notes that when thinking becomes a part of a young child's routine, the child becomes more open and responsive to situations that require thinking…

The social landscape of the United States can be mapped by using a series of cultural fault lines. This topography portrays conditions that descriptions of the surface fail to illuminate. Many of these schisms are the by-product of ideological positions that diminish personal responsibility and thoughtful civic discourse. If left unattended, these…

Bridges are some of the most majestic features in the American landscape. For classrooms, the bridge serves as an important component of one of the main themes of geography: movement. One bridge, north of Manhattan and crossing the Hudson River, is the Tappan Zee. One aspect that stands out in a way that does not at all appear reasonable: the…

Social studies teachers are tasked with aiding their students' abilities to engage in public debate and make politically sound decisions. One way the authors have found to help facilitate this is to draw connections between content knowledge and current political conversations through the use of clips from "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart." While…

What would Benjamin Franklin's Facebook page look like? Would he be "friends" with William Pierce, James Madison, or Alexander Hamilton? Would there have been a separate Facebook group for the framers of the Constitution, where they would have posted comments on the wall regarding the different stipulations that needed inclusion in the document?…

We present fascinating simple demonstration experiments recorded with high-speed cameras in the field of fluid dynamics. Examples include oscillations of falling droplets, effects happening upon impact of a liquid droplet into a liquid, the disintegration of extremely large droplets in free fall and the consequences of incompressibility. (Contains…

By means of a simple mathematical model recently developed by the authors (2010 "Phys. Educ." 45 641), the passage of the seasons on the Earth is simulated for arbitrary latitudes, taking into account sunlight attenuation in the atmosphere. The method developed can be used to predict a realistic value of the solar energy input (insolation) that…

Winds in desert regions form the well-known barchan dunes. Frequently, human settlements are threatened by the migration of these dunes. But why do these dunes move? And how is dune migration in deserts connected to scour development in the vicinity of pylons in river beds or to snow cornices in alpine regions? This paper introduces the topic of…