NPR
Identify Criteria and Constraints
What defines success? The fourth installment of a 10-part series focuses on the criteria for engineering design success in solving the plastics problem. Pupils also consider any constraints.
National Geographic
Australia, Antarctica, and Oceana
Go on a traveling adventure throughout Australia, Oceana, and Antarctica! This textbook excerpt offers a full unit of study that can easily be supplemented by extra projects or research materials. Learners study maps, read about...
PBL Pathways
Solar Toasters
Help a company maximize their profits! A detailed project-based learning activity examines two production scenarios. Your young scholars write a linear demand function. They then apply the function to develop a revenue, cost, and profit...
Teaching Tolerance
Understanding Online Searches
Discover what's behind an online search. Scholars read a handout and engage in discussions to learn how to critically evaluate online search results. Then, working in small groups, they create posters listing their demands for search...
Teaching Tolerance
Sensible Consumers
Girls like pink and boys like blue. Working in small groups, learners discuss stereotypes about children in advertisements. Then, scholars create their own manifestos about how they plan to respond to the consumer market they see in...
Teach Engineering
Consult for the Conductive Circuit Card Company
Light up someone's day with conductive greeting cards. Scholars design and create greeting cards that include LED lights. Rather than use copper tape, they apply conductive paint or copper paint to create the necessary electric circuits.
Museum of Science
Terrarium
Make a premium terrarium. Learners create a miniature terrarium to study ecosystems. They use a clear container, along with rocks, soil, moss, leaves, woodland plants, earthworms, and bugs to construct their terrariums.
Teach Engineering
Recommendations and Presentations: Drum Roll Please
Teams analyze the data they collected during the past six lessons and finalize where they will build a survival cavern. They then present their decisions to the rest of the class and justify their locations.
NPR
Define the Plastic Problem
Individuals identify a specific problem concerning plastics and write a problem statement, which describes the problem, explains why it's a problem, and identifies desired solutions.
NPR
Brainstorm and Evaluate Solutions
May the best idea win. In groups, scholars brainstorm solutions to the problem statement developed in the previous lesson. The best idea moves forward to the prototype stage.
Curated OER
Jeopardy Game Template
Oh Boy! What you have found is not just another Jeopardy game, but a template you can use to create your own. Just imagine 25 students racing to provide the question for the answer, Manifest Destiny. Complete instructions for creating a...
Two Lives Left
Cargo-Bot
What would you think of an app that provides a creative introduction to an important 21st century skill, challenges learners at many levels, and is an addictively, fun game? Did we also mention it was free? We think you will find all...
Teach Engineering
Building and Testing Model Underground Safety Caverns
Teams take their cavern designs and build a model from clay or paper mache that can be buried in sand. Testing involves dropping a bowling ball on the buried cavern. Teams dig out their cavern, inspect it for damage, and consider...
Teach Engineering
Aerogel Cookies
Cookies are definitely important for scientific learning. To study aerogels, future engineers use chocolate chip cookie dough to make models. Their task is to design a process that removes the chocolate chips from the cookie dough,...
Teach Engineering
Flight of the Fruit: Weight, Gravity and Imagination
Beware the falling fruit. Scholars design and build parachutes that can help protect fruit as it falls. They test out their creations, learning about gravity, weight, air resistance, and measurement concepts along the way.
Teach Engineering
Nanotechnology in Action: Organic Electronics
Even electronics are going organic. Future engineers learn about organic fibers and their uses in electronics and textiles. Specifically, they study graphene and its properties by creating graphite-based fibers in a laboratory setting...
Teach Engineering
Exploring Variables While Testing and Improving Mint-Mobiles (for High School)
Mint candies are good for more than just one's breath. Using basic materials such as mint candies, straws, index cards, and Popsicle sticks, scholars create race cars that meet a given budget as well as design constraints. They perform...
Curated OER
Learning From Picture Books and Technology
Fifth graders complete a demonstration on how to set up, use, and close down a camera. In this technology lesson plan, 5th graders complete the correct sequence and answer questions about camera usage.
Curated OER
Title: Digital Photo Storytelling on Five Senses, a project Based Learning Activity by Mary Gore
Students explore the 5 senses. In this technology skills activity, students participate in digital storytelling workstations that feature each of the 5 senses. Students create digital cameras and digital voice recorders to explore their...
Curated OER
PC Activities - Cut - Copy - Paste
In this technology worksheet, students read the directions for practicing the skills of moving text and copying it to another form of document.
Curated OER
Veteran's Day Activities
Fifth graders research websites to gather information about Veteran's Day to develop a quality school wide Veteran's Day Program and classroom group presentation.
Curated OER
Apples and Apple Activities
Students investigate apples. For this reading comprehension lesson, students read a book about apples then compare and contrast, make graphs, distinguish between fact and fiction and work in groups. Students work in groups...
Curated OER
The Phantom of the Computer Lab
Learners calculate the power consumption of computers in school. In this physics lesson, students design an experiment to determine whether the school should unplug computers at the end of the day. They collect data and report findings...
Curated OER
Basics of Environmental Science
Ninth graders explore environmental concerns of the community and identify the basic needs of people, wildlife and domestic animals. Working both individually and in groups, they also define natural resources and compare and contrast...