Virginia Department of Education
Balanced
Bring balance to your lesson plans with an activity that asks individuals to solve one-step linear equations with inverse operations. Balance scales help learners understand the concept of isolating the variable.
Curated OER
Ancient Aztecs
Is it a calendar? A religious symbol? A political statement? One thing for certain is that Aztec sun stone designs remain an important symbol in Mexican cultural art. Young artists craft their own Aztec Sun design incorporating ideas...
Cornell University
Catapults
Ready, aim, fire! Launch to a new level of understanding as scholars build and test their own catapults. Learners explore lever design and how adjusting the fulcrum changes the outcome.
IB Psychology
Key Terms Traffic Lights
How much does your class know about psychology? What about empirical evidence? If they could use some time to learn the essentials of psychology, use a quick reference sheet to note what they know before the test, after the unit, and at...
National Arts Centre
Stage-Space Awareness
Introduce scenic designers to stage-space awareness with three fun activities that demonstrate how placement on the nine stage areas convey emphasis and clarify relationships.
Institute for Humane Education
Not So Fair and Balanced: Analyzing Bias in the Media
Life is not always fair. Who's heard that before? This same concept moves to a larger scale using prejudice and bias. Pupils discuss where prejudice attitudes derive and how they develop throughout life. Reading comprehension...
Franklin Covey
The Habits of Highly Effective Teens
Sally and Joe both want the last cookie in the jar, so they split it in half. That's an example of a win-win situation, one of the many principles Sean Covey outlines in his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens. Using the...
Newseum
Editorials and Opinion Articles
Reading the news is fun, and that's a fact! With the lesson plan, scholars differentiate between fact and opinion as they read editorial articles. They complete a worksheet to analyze the information before writing their own editorials...
Glynn County School System
Lives and Deaths of Stars
Star light, star bright ... just how long can you wish on that star? Well, it depends on its mass. The presentation explains the life cycle of stars based on their sizes. Scholars learn about the life expectancy of a star based on the...
Curated OER
Budget Busters
Use this economic activity to focus on writing summaries of informational text. First, middle schoolers define common economic terms used to describe news about the economy. They closely read news about the federal budget deficit and...
Curated OER
Using Fairy Tales to Debate Ethics
Is trickery ever justified? Is it okay to steal from someone who has stolen from you? Puss, from Puss in Boots, and Jack, from Jack and the Beanstalk, might have some ideas about these ethical questions. After listening to a series of...
Curated OER
Writing Women: The Yellow Wallpaper
Students examine the historical, social, cultural and economic context of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's story, The Yellow Wallpaper. Students determine the place of the middle class woman and her role in society.
Curated OER
The Nine Planets
A solid lesson on teaching the nine planets in our solar system is here for you. In it, young scientists learn the correct order of the planets, and they choose one of the planets to do a research report on. They must come up with five...
BBC
Global Community: T-Shirt Activity
Examine fair trade and the impacts it has on the global community. Kids consider how t-shirts are made, where they come from, and how fair trade works. They design t-shirts that describe the affects of fair trade on various populations...
Curated OER
A House Dividing: The Growing Crisis of Sectionalism in Antebellum America
Students explore the debates over American slavery and the power of the American federal government for the first half of the 19th century and how the regional economies and political events produced a widening split between the states.
Curated OER
Slavery's Opponents and Defenders
Students explore the wide-ranging debate over American slavery and the lives of its leading opponents and defenders and the views they held about America's "peculiar institution."
Curated OER
Enough To Make Your Head Spin
Students examine body language in the United States and Bulgaria. They also discover other forms of communication. They also examine a map of Bulgaria.
Curated OER
Invetories Slave owner or not?
Primary source analysis is a great way to bring history to life. Learners examine a series of personal inventories taken from Southern white males who died during the Civil War era. They analyze the documents to determine the social and...
Curated OER
Woodlands Ribbonwork
Learners make art based on the ribbon work of the Woodland Indians. Background information on the art form and procedure are laid out in an easy to follow step-by-step format.
Curated OER
Electricity and Food: From Glowing Pickles in Citrus Batteries
Fifth graders explore electrical concepts and host a guest speaker. This instructional activity sets up guidelines for students to follow when they have a guest speaker. Students are primed to become actively involved in a lecture or...
Curated OER
Choosing the Right Word for the Sentence
Learners select the best word (from four choices) to complete eight sentences. They read a complete sentence and choose the best word to complete subsequent sentences using context as their guide. Theme of the sheet is making things,...
Curated OER
Speed Score
A fast and fun way to practice shooting basketball. Small cooperative groups help each other tally up the most baskets made in a certain period of time. There are a couple ideas included to increase or decrease the difficulty of the...
Curated OER
Understanding Core Values Using the Frayer Model
Students complete the Frayer Model. In this literature lesson, students review the concept of theme in literature. Students identify major themes in books they've read. Students learn the attributes of the Frayer Model and then complete...
Curated OER
Nutrition In Me! Club
Students practice food safety and hand washing. In this health activity, students discuss the presence of germs and how to keep yourself safe. Students wash their hands after applying Glo-Germ to see what spots they missed.