Disease Teacher Resources

Throughout history, humans have been forced to overcome diseases that have threatened the survival of our species. This short instructional video focuses on one such disease—smallpox, the first and only disease to be completely...

Combine informational reading skills with fictional text in an innovative historical fiction lessons. After reading a fictional text related to diseases, class members read non-fictional text to gain knowledge about specific infectious...

Viruses can spread like wildfire, and mathematics can model the speed of infection. Given a function, scholars analyze it to describe the spread of a disease within a stadium. Learners find the initial number infected and the maximum...

Discuss how diseases have impacted human history. Divide your class into groups and assign each group one of the following: tuberculosis, malaria, plague, cholera, smallpox, and AIDS. They read up on, complete a concept map, and present...

The deadly smallpox virus, which killed between 300-500 million people in the twentieth century alone, is a feature player in modern world history. Discover how this disease spread across the globe by and through various nations...

Encourage the spread of knowledge in your class with this cross-curricular epidemic simulation. Pulling together science, social studies, and math, this lesson engages students in modeling the spread of infectious diseases, collecting...

Most people know that Ebola is a deadly virus that they want to avoid, but understand very little about the disease itself. This short video hopes to change that by explaining how the virus affects the body, the symptoms it causes, and...

Here's an activity that asks class members to explore diseases and their causes, prevention, and cures to better inform the public. After researching, discussing, and learning about communicable and noncommunicable diseases, groups...

Introduce infectious diseases and the epidemiologic triangle. A helpful resource describes the agent, host, and environment from the three vertices as well as the time factor, which is in the middle. Scholars complete a simple...

These activities and instructional handouts will help your learners to understand not only the causes, transmission, and prevention of HIV/AIDS, but also gain a deeper understanding of the chain of infection when diseases are spread.

Looking for a valuable resource on the spread of infectious diseases? Here is a lesson in which pupils simulate the spread of diseases and learn about how to prevent them from spreading. Class members read case studies about diseases,...

As part of their study of disease prevention tips, class members engage in a debate about who should be the classroom's Stop Germs Mascot—Professor Grime or Ace Clean.

Designed to accompany the 13-minute video The Making of the Fittest: The Birth and Death of Genes, this handout serves as both a viewing guide during the video and an analysis of how the adaptations of the icefish might help treat some...

Some diseases kill more than 50 percent of those infected. The video focuses on the five deadliest diseases, explaining how they spread, the symptoms, their geographic locations, and the death rate for each. It turns out that the...

Explore the history of cholera and its effect on society with your biology class. Young biologists will then proceed to grow their own germs, prepared from live cultures, and follow the steps of the scientific method to generate data....

Emerging epidemiologists investigate infectious diseases. In this disease lesson, learners gather information about various diseases. Students create their own pamphlet about the disease. Learners use peer assessment to grade their work.

Did you know that every four seconds, a new case of Alzheimer's disease is diagnosed? Future researchers find out the biology behind this devastating disease in which the victim suffers memory loss, but their families never forget the...

Is your brain running a little slow? Just reboot it and you'll be good to go. This advice may sound ridiculous, but by watching this video you will learn how through a process called neurogenesis, adult brains are able repair and replace...

From start to finish, this is a truly excellent lesson plan addressing the epidemic of diet-related disease in the United States. Learners begin with a reading excerpt of detailed information on trends in the American diet and the...

Students examine the primary controllable and uncontrollable factors that put one at greater risk for developing heart disease. Through discussion, research, physical tests, and questionnaires they determine whether or not they are at...

Discuss the symptoms and variations from infectious diseases from one person to the next. After a class discussion, small groups complete research on the topic. 

Introduces your class to random processes in networks with an activity that uses information about disease spread using the susceptible, infectious, resistant (SIR) model. Participants determine whether a susceptible person becomes...

During the first few sniffles of a cold, you can't help wondering where you picked up the illness. Watch an Ed Ted video that details the difference between miasma theory and germ theory, and the ways that Dr. John Snow's research...

Here is a different approach: emerging epidemiologists first go home to interview family on the topic of infectious disease. Then they come to class and view a video and PowerPoint that explore how climate change may increase the...