Engineering Teacher Resources

Engineers solve problems. As a STEM teacher in the 21st century, you guide students to solve problems every day. Meet the next generation of engineers!

Get their creative minds working with elementary engineering projects, such as a popsicle stick bridge activity or a Play-Doh circuit project. A NASA lesson encourages young engineers to design their own rocket launch platform, while sports fans can predict and test bounce heights of various balls. 

Looking for something else? You’ll find it in a full unit plan on elementary STEM construction and engineering activities.

Challenge middle and high schoolers with a soda can steam engine project to practice the principles of steam engines. Have them control variables to a virtual heat machine to find the most efficient setup—and then show a video on the second law of thermodynamics that explains how they can never create an engine that reaches 100% efficiency. 

Connect engineering with biology in a project that uses biomimicry as a model for student projects. You can also explore the future of genetic engineering, including its benefits and risks, with an informative science video.

Just like the advances of engineering, the instructional possibilities are endless. Use our teacher-selected resources as inspiration or download them directly for implementation. The future is here—and Lesson Planet is, too!

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The Engineering Process

For Teachers 3rd - 8th
Discover the ins and outs of the engineering process from Crash Course Kids series of 17 informative and engaging videos. Each video offers insightful details into the world of engineering, captivating animation, and kid-friendly humor...
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Adventure Engineering Challenge: Asteroid Impact

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
Oh, no! An asteroid is on a collision course with Earth!. The challenge, should your students choose to accept it, is to design underground survival caverns to shelter people for one year. Over the course of eight lessons, engineering...
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9 Items in Unit
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Environmental Engineering and Water Chemistry

For Teachers 7th - 9th Standards
Introduce young scientists to the fundamentals of environmental engineering with a nine-resource collection that looks at air, land, and water quality concerns. The unit begins with a PowerPoint presentation that provides background...
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8 Items in Unit
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Inquiry in Action: Fifth Grade Chapter 5 - Engineering Design

For Teachers 5th
Inquiry in Action: Fifth Grade Chapter 5 - Engineering Design is comprised of a single project-based assessment. The assessment helps highlight the importance of prior knowledge as individuals design a floatation device for a cell phone....
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Understanding Science and Engineering Through Solar Power

For Teachers 2nd - 5th Standards
The Understanding Science and Engineering Through Solar Power unit module teaches scholars how to conduct investigations and the steps for scientific inquiry and experimentation. To begin, young scientists conduct two probes to...
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8 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: Engineering Nature - DNA Visualization and Manipulation

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Two lessons teach young biomedical engineers and biologists how it is possible to visualize complex biomolecule structures. In the first lesson, scholars research specific imaging technologies, and in the second, they learn about...
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10 Items in Unit
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Moon Munchies: Human Exploration Project and Engineering Design Challenge

For Teachers Pre-K - 6th
NASA and the International Technology and Engineering Educators Association, or ITEEA, present young scientists with a challenge: design and build lunar plant growth chambers so that astronauts can grow edible plants on the moon. Class...
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Teach Engineering: The Science and Engineering Behind Harry Potter

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Maybe young wizards shouldn’t tickle sleeping dragons; but, three lessons and two activities are sure to tickle young science wizards as they study the science and engineering behind the Harry Potter series. Through interactive, hands-on...
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11 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: Next-Generation Surgical Tools in the Body

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Young engineers design laparoscopic surgical tools in an 11-lesson unit aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards. The first lesson introduces the class to the abdominopelvic cavity. Teams learn what it is like to perform...
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32 Items in Topic
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STEM Ed Hub: Design Resources

For Students 3rd - 6th Standards
Engineering design-based activities make learning science fun. Young engineers design dams, lifeguard chairs, musical instruments, candy bags, and much more. They also use measurement skills to solve the mystery of the missing pin. Each...
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Up, Up and Away! - Airplanes

For Students 5th - 7th Standards
Oh, if only Sir Isaac and Bernoulli could see us now. Even Orville and Wilbur would be amazed by what engineers have designed using their ideas. Next generation engineers put these principles to use as they use what they learn about...
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Life Science

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
Photosynthesis, extinction, biomimicry, and bioremediation. Young environmental engineers study these processes. Using photosynthesis as a model and biomimicry as an example, groups research how nature provides hints for engineering...
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10 Items in Unit
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Simple Machines

For Students 7th - 9th Standards
A collection of five lessons and activities introduce young engineers to simple and compound machines. Groups use the engineering design process to design a Rube Goldberg machine to move a circus elephant into a rail car, a pulley system...
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28 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: Keepers of the Gate

For Teachers 9th - 11th
Red Rover, Red Rover, send young intracellular engineers right over! In this unit of the TeachEngineering series, scholars tackle the challenge of determining why Grandmother’s suggestion of gargling with salt water to relieve a sore...
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TeachEngineering: Hybrid Vehicle Design Challenge

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Wouldn’t it be lovely if there was a way to capture the energy given off by a vehicle and transform it into kinetic energy to power the vehicle? That is the challenge young engineers face in an eight resource TeachEngineering: Hybrid...
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5 Items in Curriculum Set
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Inquiry in Action: Fifth Grade

For Teachers 5th
The Inquiry in Action: Fifth Grade Curriculum set contains five chapters, comprised of 16 lessons, activity sheets, videos, and other resources to help explain science concepts to young learners. In Chapter 1 - Matter is Made of Tiny...
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TeachEngineering: Forces All Around

For Teachers 6th - 8th
Imagine using a hot glue gun or a glue stick to demonstrate tension, compression, and torsion! A six-part series of lessons and hands-on activities teach young engineers about the fundamental facets of engineering design: forces, loads,...
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25 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: Using Nanoparticles to Detect, Treat and Protect from Skin Cancer

For Teachers 10th - 12th Standards
Young scientists take on the role of biomedical engineers as they accept the challenge of using nanoparticles to help detect, treat, and protect people from skin cancer. Researchers perform hands-on activities to become familiar with the...
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27 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: NanoTech - Insights into a Nano-Sized World

For Teachers 7th - 12th Standards
Ferrofluids, quantum dots, and good nanoparticles. Young material scientists and engineers are introduced to the field of nanoscience with two lessons and four activities. Topics covered include an introduction to nanotechnology and its...
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7 Items in Unit
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TeachEngineering: It's a Connected World - The Beauty of Network Science

For Teachers 7th - 10th Standards
A series of lessons and activities show scholars how engineers use graphs to understand large and complex systems. The first lesson provides the beginnings of graph theory by introducing set theory, graphs, and degree distributions of a...
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TeachEngineering: Next-Generation Surgical Tools in the Body

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Designed for high schoolers, the 11 lessons and activities in the “TeachEngineering: Next-Generation Surgical Tools in the Body” unit module prepare STEM teams to design prototypes of laparoscopic surgical robots. After an introduction...
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Crash Course Navigating Digital Information

For Students 9th - 12th Standards
In an age when so much information is delivered online, media literacy skills are essential. John Green's Crash Course on Navigating Digital Information provides 21st-century learners with the skills they need to help them evaluate the...
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Evolution and Speciation

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
A collection of five Nature League videos explores evolution and speciation. Four evolution types, in-breeding, out-breeding, and how engineers have designed technology, household items, and medicines inspired by nature. Host Britt...
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8 Items in Topic
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The Science of Food

For Teachers 4th - 12th Standards
Alchemy in the kitchen? A collection explains the science behind the food chain. Videos and support materials cover everything from yummy things like cheese, to chocolate, to sourdough bread, from science topics like genetically...

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