Ocean tides are not typically high in our consciousness here in Missouri, but in teaching astronomy and physical science the subject always comes up, and teachers of physical science and astronomy are all quite familiar with the textbook explanations. Our goal here is not to explain tides1,2 but to make some suggestions about how, on their own, students can discover relationships between hypotheses and actual evidence.
REFERENCES
1.
M.
Sawicki
, “Myths about gravity and tides
,” Phys. Teach.
37
, 438
–441
(Oct. 1999
). Also see: http://www.jal.cc.il.us/∼mikolajsawicki/Tides_new2.pdf.2.
H.V. Thurman and E.A. Burton, Introductory Oceanography (Prentice Hall, 2001).
3.
Peter Tyson at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/galileo.
4.
Robert
de Levie
, “Tidal analysis on a spreadsheet
,” Am. J. Phys.
72
, 644
–651
(May 2004
).5.
http://co-ops.nos.noaa.gov.
6.
http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/RS_OneDay.html.
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© 2006 American Association of Physics Teachers.
2006
American Association of Physics Teachers
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