Science newswise 2
Ruth Jarman and Billy McClune
Hatfield, UK: Association for Science Education 2011 | Pp180 | £30 | ISBN9780863574306
Reviewed by Trevor Critchley

I heartily recommend this excellent resource. It is a comprehensively researched book which warrants a lengthy read before you dive in. It won't be terribly effective if you just want quick off the shelf resources to slot into your lesson next Monday. The authors make a compelling case for including science stories from the media into lessons and give a good range of them to start with.

The chapter Using the news to teach science content  is unsurprisingly short. Scientists don't usually expect much factual detail from the mainstream media. The three resources in this chapter are very good and provide some interesting contexts for learning. For example, an article on tooth decay suggests a neat way to look at the pH scale, and there are good ideas for linked practical work. 

Where this book excels is in presenting the case for using news articles to cover How Science Works, and there are two detailed chapters on this. The approach is well-justified, backed up by surveys of current practice and the resources are relevant and engaging. I particularly liked the chapter The science behind the headlines, where students are asked to provide the scientific detail to back up a general interest article relating to transport and climate change. This is a very transferable idea. 

The final and longest section of the book looks at how science is represented in the media. I was initially going to pull out this part and drop it off in our English department, but the authors give several better ideas for possible collaborative projects across the curriculum and I find myself strongly agreeing with them. With a greater emphasis on the quality of written communication in the new GCSE specifications, there is good reason for students to engage with scientific articles from the point of view of style and message. 

Boardworks AS chemistry
Oxford, UK: Boardworks
Oxford, UK: Boardworks 2009 | AS and A2 Chemistry £799 each. Full A-Level Chemistry £1499 |
Reviewed by Wendy Pitt

Boardworks is very well known for producing teaching materials for use with interactive whiteboards and this creation for AS Chemistry is a delight to use. Its straightforward, simple instructions are almost superfluous as using the product is intuitive to anyone with minimal experience of PowerPoint.

On first sight the price may seem prohibitive but, as it includes a site license with no annual fee, all teachers and students at your institution can have access to it. The software can be loaded onto any number of machines on site or be installed in a virtual learning environment.

Resources for an AS topic can be found quickly as the materials are mapped to the requirements of the present courses' specifications (AQA, Edexcel and OCR) and navigation is easy.

My personal preference, in the interest of avoiding the danger of 'death by PowerPoint', would be for sensible but limited use of the software by the teacher in the classroom. Being fully customisable, it is relatively quick and simple to extract sections to illustrate a concept. It can also be used by the students as a learning and revision tool.

The virtual experiments might be used prior to practical work since the visual, animated steps could be very helpful to students who find difficulty in following written instructions.

Lab coats in Hollywood: science, scientists and cinema
David Kirby
Cambridge, Massachusetts, US: The MIT Press 2011 | Pp280 | £19.95 (HB) | ISBN9780262014786
Reviewed by Paul Wolstenholme-Hogg

The synergy and history of the scientific consultant and film maker is perfectly presented in this well researched, and excellently written, superlative book by David Kirby.

The book is presented from both the director's and the consultant's point of view. It discusses the film maker's battle to add value and authenticity to science-based films by incorporating as much verisimilitude as their budget can handle, whilst at the same time it analyses the science consultant's struggle to get their values and theories across to the film makers against those very constraints.

For the consultant, balancing their credibility against the artistic freedom of the film maker can result in positive and negative outcomes and this is given in ample evidence throughout the book. Both director and scientific consultant will ultimately aim to add value to the film without compromising the budget, storytelling or science.

The book shows that there are some interesting compromises to be made during the film making process. Although the director will most likely have the final say in the manufacture and presentation of a film, the audience will eventually determine whether the scientific content is authentic and believable at the box office. This will ultimately be a result of the determination and influencing skills of the scientific consultant.

Lab coats in Hollywood  is an excellently presented work and a must for anyone interested in the interaction of film makers and scientists. It should also appeal to those interested in using media such as film to deliver key scientific content to a larger non-scientific audience. 

Chemistry (6th edn)
James Brady, Neil Jespersen, Alison Hyslop
Chichester, UK | John Wiley & Sons 2011 | Pp1232 | £54.99 (PB) | ISBN9780470646175
Reviewed by Matthew Almond

This is the sixth edition of a well-established textbook, but one that is probably more familiar in the US than in the UK. It aims to be a general chemistry text for students starting on university level chemistry courses.

The authors have set themselves three clear goals in producing this book: first, to strengthen the connection between macroscopic observations and the microscopic behaviour of atoms and molecules, secondly, to enhance problem-solving skills in students and finally to integrate with the on line resources available from the publishers at WileyPLUS. These are sensible aims but to me the book does not quite reach the right level for UK students. 

Chapter one is a good case in point where the atomic and molecular view of matter is described. The material here might be useful revision for some students but it is well below the level that is taught in first year university courses. These concepts are, however, developed further in chapter ten where theories of bonding are considered and this does lead on eventually to molecular orbital theory which is a significant part of first year university chemistry teaching in the UK. 

In fact, physical chemistry is covered quite well, although a large amount of the material is below the level taught in UK university courses. However, the book is very weak in inorganic and organic chemistry. In an 1100 page book, organic chemistry is covered only in pages 1047-1085 and inorganic chemistry is relegated to a discussion of nuclear reactions and metal complexes. 

Features that I like are the 'multi-concept problems' and 'exercises in critical thinking' - mainly in physical chemistry - at the end of each chapter. Some of these would get the students to think and would provide useful discussion topics for tutorials and seminars. 

My overall view of this book is that it could provide useful background reading in physical chemistry for both A-level and first-year university students. I do not think, however, that it would be useful as a textbook for most UK university courses because of the general level of much of the material and the very small amount of organic and inorganic chemistry covered.