4.5 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 31 July 2014
⏱️ 29 minutes
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ExpeRimental There's an online wealth of science demonstrations you can try at home with your kids. But what's sometimes lacking is the encouragement of questioning the science in these DIY experiments. Science teacher and film maker Alom Shaha has devised a series of videos with the Royal Institution showing parents experimenting with home-made lava lamps, bubbles and bottle cannons. He hopes that amidst the mess and mistakes, some scientific thinking can be nurtured.
Rosetta The European Space Agency's robotic spacecraft Rosetta is about to start its detailed study of the comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. In the audacious and risky mission, the craft will follow the orbit of the comet as it approaches and passes the Sun. It will attempt to land a probe on the surface of the icy, rocky mass. It's hoped the mission will provide great insight into what comets are made of, how they behave as they heat up, creating its gassy coma and tail. And it's hoped Rosetta and its lander will be able to tell about where Earth's water and even some of the building blocks for life might have come from.
MOOCs Massive Open Online Courses are free and open to anyone with access to the internet. You can study a huge range of topics from cancer and dental photography to quantum physics, and even the archaeology and history of Hadrian's Wall. Critics say these higher education courses are just a PR exercise by universities, and that it will set up a two tier system in education. But Kathryn Skelton from FutureLearn, a platform for many of these MOOCs, argues that they encourage people who would not normally extend their education to take part and the universities providing the courses can gain great insight into the changing face of teaching methods.
Evolutionary Psychology Last week Adam Rutherford and Alice Roberts had a robust discussion on the biologising of the human condition, with Professor David Canter. Listeners wrote in to complain that we didn't give an evolutionary psychologist a right to reply, so this week, listener and evolutionary psychologist Rob Burriss has his say.
Producer: Fiona Roberts.
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
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| 0:36.0 | Hello, I'm Alice Roberts and this is the podcast of BBC Inside Science, broadcast on the 31st of July 2014. |
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| 0:47.8 | UK slash Radio 4. |
| 0:50.4 | Schools out for summer but this week on BBC Inside Science it's education education |
| 0:56.6 | with the summer holidays upon us do you have a house full of young kids like me |
| 1:01.0 | on days at home once they've had enough of painting and |
| 1:04.4 | crafts and once they've exhausted the joys of the paddling pool what next a bit of |
| 1:10.1 | science that's what the Royal Institution has produced a series of films suitable for |
| 1:15.4 | primary age children showing parents how to do some really great science experiments with everyday |
| 1:20.9 | ingredients and household objects. |
| 1:23.0 | BBC Inside Sciences Roland Peas drew the short straw |
| 1:28.0 | and got to test out some of the new experimental films |
| 1:31.0 | with his son Felix and friend Otterley. |
| 1:34.0 | Hello I'm Felix and I'm in year five. |
| 1:37.0 | Hello I'm utterly and I'm in year two. |
| 1:40.0 | Do you like school as Mrs Felix does? |
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