What locations on Earth get the longest number of hours of daylight in the summer? Hint: It's not the equator! Use real-world sunrise and sunset data to develop trigonometric models that can be used to estimate the number of hours of...

Gain a little interest in functions with a real-life task. Young scholars analyze home loan data with a geometric sequence and series. They use the models to make predictions about the total loan payments at certain intervals in a...

This is an opportunity for young mathematicians to apply reasoning to solve real-world problems with ratios. Even though there are three candidates for class president, students will only consider two at a time, making the first problem...

Do homework grades really determine test scores? Learn whether lines of best fit, correlation coefficients, and residuals can be used to determine test scores when given homework grades. (It would certainly save teachers time in grading...

Enrich your study of living things with these cross-curricular math activities. Following along with the story Tillena Lou's Day in the Sun, learners will practice addition and subtraction, learn how to measure volume and length,...

Seeking to derive the formula for the volume of a square pyramid, geometry learners construct six square based pyramids that, when pieced together properly, form a cube. Two short videos demonstrate the relationship...

Visit the Magic Treehouse and take your class on a trip through time with a reading of the children's book Mummies in the Morning. Using the story to spark an investigation into Egyptian culture, this literature unit engages...

DNA is the code for all biological traits, both plant and animal. Using an exploratory lesson, learners begin to explore the concept of a biological code by decoding word puzzles. They then extract DNA from plant cells using detergent to...

Who actually goes looking for a virus? Expose your class to the high-stakes life of an epidemiologist on the trail of the Nipah virus. Pupils engage in a short video, then examine how scientists predict, model, and find the source of...

Every time you purchase something from the store, it goes into a bag, but what happens to the bag? This lesson encourages your learners to think about what happens to those plastic and paper bags and their effect on the environment. Use...

Here learners get to flex some serious algebraic muscles through an investigation of logistic growth. The properties of the constant terms in the logistic growth formula are unraveled in a short but content-dense...

Let your class become master builders. Scholars use Legos® or K'nex® pieces to create a structure that looks like an actual building in existence. The time limit is 12 minutes, so you better start building!

Using NASA's Live Access Server, earth scientists compare the temperature, precipitation, and normalized difference vegetation index for four different locations. They use the data to identify the climate zone of each location using...

Geometry meets earth science as high schoolers investigate the cause and features of the four seasons. The effects of Earth's axis tilt features prominently, along with both the rotation of the earth about the axis and its orbit...

Engineering design projects serve as great opportunities for collaborative problem solving. In this case, students work in small groups designing, building, and eventually testing a structure that meets a teacher-specified objective. It...

Here you will find a model of a linear relationship between two quantities, the water depth of a channel and the distance across the channel at water level. The cross section of the channel is the shape of an isosceles trapezoid. The...

Explain the timing of a lake cleanup to the EPA using calculus. A project-based learning opportunity has learners compare rate functions to compute a total change. Their solutions explain the time needed to rid a lake of pollutants.

Design a plan for finding the best health insurance for your money. Learners compare two health plans by writing and graphing piecewise functions representing the plan rules. Using Excel software, they create a technical report...

Intended as a follow up to the Protecting Your Drinking Water activity, young environmentalists use their assessment of the a hypothetical town's water supply to debate the installation of underground chemical storage tanks. With...

Add a sense of excitement to your math class with this race across the country. Using their knowledge of all things circular, young mathematicians work in pairs answering a series of pi-related word problems as they hop from one city to...

Math rocks! Cavern design teams determine the rankings of rock types based upon desirability points. The points are connected to the properties of the rocks and their usefulness in building a cavern. 

Using data from the Census Bureau, learners discover the growth in minority-owned businesses over time. After crunching numbers, analytical questions probe the reasons behind the shift. 

Algebra learners must know how to use rational numbers to approximate irrationals. This resource asks participants to decide which number is larger without using a calculator. It makes a great exercise to use as a five-minute transition...

How should a cashier stock a cash register with coins? Learners use mathematical modeling and expected value to determine how many rolls of coins of each type they should place in a cash register.