Bonneville
How to Build a Motor
Electrical engineers entertain and explain how to construct an electromagnet-driven motor. Kellie and Mike, the hosts of the show, are enthusiastic teachers that will help introduce a project that you likely include in your middle school...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Basic Electric Transformers
Life as we know it would not be possible without electric transformers, so there are fewer more pertinent topics for your eager young engineers. An astounding amount of background information is provided to help you develop a lecture on...
Bonneville
The Great Marble Drop
Mike and Kellie, a team of electrical engineers, demonstrate how to to design a contraption that accurately drops a marble onto a target. The materials needed and general instructions are provided on the website or via a downloadable...
Bonneville
How to Build a Turbine
Here is a six-minute video of a pair of electrical engineers that illustrate how to build a wind turbine. A list of materials is provided, along with general guidelines for your class. Use this to introduce turbine design to your...
Curated OER
Get Charged!
Students explore the concept of electricity in this activity based unit. In this physical science lesson plan, students focus on electricity and electrical engineering. The teaching unit includes 5 activities to develop students...
Curated OER
Adventures in Electrical Engineering
Students explore electricity by conducting a series of experiments. In this physics lesson, students discover the relationship between current, voltage and resistance. They calculate voltage and power in a given system.
Curated OER
Products of an Electrical Engineer
Students explore products made by an electrical engineer. In this engineering instructional activity, students complete two worksheets identifying products made by an electrical engineer.
Rochester Institute of Technology
Electrical Energy
My friend told me how electricity is measured and I was like Watt! In the hands-on activity, learners explore electricity by building circuits, both parallel and series. They also determine how increasing the number of light bulbs and...
DiscoverE
Electrical Liquids
Liquid or not, here comes the electricity. Scholars test the conductivity of various substances using a circuit that includes a light bulb. If the light bulb lights up, then the liquid is a conductor. What a bright idea!
Curated OER
Many Paths
Students explore the composition and practical application of parallel circuitry, compared to series circuitry. They design and build parallel circuits and investigate their characteristics, and apply Ohm's law. They recognize that...
Teach Engineering
Electricity and Magnetic Fields
Introduce your class to the idea of magnetic fields around electrical wires with an activity that provides the information about the direction of a magnetic field around a wire carrying an electric current.
Kenan Fellows
Electricity: Sources, Usage, Challenges, and the Future
What does the future of energy look like? Junior engineers collaborate to discover a solution to the global energy crisis during a very hands-on lesson. The unit focuses on learning through collaboration to develop a deep understanding...
Rochester Institute of Technology
Chemical Reactions and Electricity
After a discussion of chemical reactions and electricity, scholars break into groups and follow a scripted activity to discover if fruit can power a clock. After a concluding discussion, the class a presented with a challenge.
Curated OER
Circuit Math
Seven circuits are spread over three pages. One is a parallel circuit, one is a series circuit, and the rest are combinations. Emergent electrical engineers solve for current, voltage, or resistance. They fill in a chart for each...
Curated OER
Electrical Engineering - The Inside Story
Students review electricity. In this physics lesson plan, students attempt to find a way to determine if a transformer is fixing to fail. The lesson reviews electricity concepts that the students should already be familiar with.
Curated OER
Wire Maze
Middle school electrical engineers design a maze out of wire and connect it in a circuit to a noise-making or lighting device. The idea is to string a paperclip along the wire without touching it along the way. The noise-maker or light...
Curated OER
More About Static Electricity
Students examine the concept that static electricity is a phenomenon that involves positive and negative charges. They explore the Static Electricity section of the Science, Technology and Engineering website to learn more about the...
Teach Engineering
Powering a Device Using Food
Eat up a resource on using food to power electrical devices. Future engineers first experiment with different fruits and vegetables to determine the amount of electrical energy they provide. Based on the data, they design and create an...
Curated OER
Destination Outer Space
Students investigate space travel. In this space travel lesson students examine space exploration history, engineers and scientists involved in space exploration, and Newton's third law of motion. Students make rockets.
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Get Connected with Ohm's Law
Ideal for your electricity unit, especially with middle schoolers, this lesson plan gets engineers using multimeters in electrical circuits to explore the relationships among voltage, current, and resistance. Older learners may even plot...
Purdue University
Design of a Door Alarm
How does electricity work? Budding scientists explore the concepts of electrical currents and open and closed circuits with class discussion and a hands-on activity using a battery to turn on a light bulb. Learners also make predictions...
Teach Engineering
Building a Piezoelectric Generator
In pairs, learners build a piezoelectric generator from readily available electric components in the second and final installment of the two-part series. Tapping the piezoelectric element produces enough electricity to light an LED....
Curated OER
Hybrid Vehicles: Cut Pollution and Save Money
Math and science meet in this lesson on hybrid electric automobiles. This 24-page resource provides everything you need for teaching a lesson that compares the use of internal combustion engines to hybrid electric engines. Participants...
TryEngineering
All About Electric Motors
Learners study the basic principles of electric motors and explore everyday uses. They build a working model of an electric motor for classroom use, using an inexpensive kit. Then, they work as an "engineering" team to determine the...