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Bill Nye The Science Guy


In just about every unit I teach I show a Bill Nye the Science Guy video.

Because our school does not have the series on CD or VHS I have to get creative about finding the videos to borrow. Normally I do a search through our school's library system (that links to all the other library systems in our district) or through our local Beaufort County library system (they have all kinds of great videos you can use in the classroom....so does Netflix if you have a subscription...although they don't have Bill Nye). Normally I can find them somewhere and then I have our librarian place an inner office loan for them (at the beginning of our unit because they take FOREVER to get to us). Worse case scenario I have a friend at another school who happens to have access to the entire Bill Nye Science Guy set (the entire set costs $3,000) but they are not in the library system and she will lend me one knowing she'll get it back :) Each video is $30 through this site and is worth trying to get your librarian to order those episodes that are specific to the units you teach.

We are going into Astronomy right now and these are the videos I like to have on hand:

The Sun
The Moon (excellent explanation of phases of the moon)
Gravity

There are several others in his Astronomy series that don't quite hit our standards. If I can find them I try to get them as a filler if needed.

Our next unit is Organisms and Our Environment and I like the following videos for that (there are a lot in this series):

Amphibians
Reptiles
Mammals
Plants
Flowers
Insects
Invertebrates

For Weather I like:

Atmosphere
Seasons
Water Cycle

For Light, Electricty and Magnets I like:

Electricity
Light and Color
Magnetisim
Title One schools generally have a lot more money and could probably get away with requesting an order but I always wondered if I could write a grant for the videos that I like (mmmm...something to think about for next year :)
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Comments

Mr. Catania said…
Hey! I use Bill Nye videos often when introducing a unit too. I found his great website that has most of the Bill Nye videos you can download in parts and it's not blocked by the county on my school computer. Here it is:
http://www.gamequarium.org/cgi-bin/search/search.cgi
January 30, 2011 at 3:53 PM
Eve Heaton said…
Awesome resource!!! Thank you so much. I will definitely pass that on to the teachers in my district :)

Mrs. Heaton
January 31, 2011 at 6:29 AM
Anonymous said…
Hi! Thanks so much for sharing your info and resources. I recently discovered that you can purchase Bill Nye videos on itunes for $1.99. I'm assuming they are the same ones.
August 20, 2011 at 4:44 PM
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