TryEngineering
Try Engineering: Simple Kitchen Machines
Team lesson focuses on the different types of simple machines, how they work, and how they can be found in daily life.
TryEngineering
Try Engineering: Chair Lift Challenge
Lesson investigates how engineers develop safe transportation systems to operate in a variety of climates and environments. Teams of students work together to construct a "chair lift" made from everyday materials as a test of this...
Discovery Education
Discovery Education: Physical Science: Gravity Gets You Down
In this lesson, students make predictions about falling objects of different sizes and masses to learn about gravity and air resistance. Includes audio vocabulary list and extension activities.
Science Education Resource Center at Carleton College
Serc: Marble Stop
In this two-part instructional activity, young scholars will discover that no matter what the shape of the track, the marble will rise to the same vertical height. They will begin to understand the concepts of gravity, motion, and force.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Launch Into Learning: Catapults!
Students learn about catapults, including the science and math concepts behind them, as they prepare for the associated activity in which they design, build and test their own catapults. They learn about force, accuracy, precision and...
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Physics of the Flying T Shirt
Students are introduced to the physics concepts of air resistance and launch angle as they apply to catapults. This includes the basic concepts of position, velocity and acceleration and their relationships to one another. They use...
Science and Mathematics Initiative for Learning Enhancement (SMILE)
Smile: Objects Race
In this lesson plan grab a slope and different objects. Roll the objects down the slope and record which is the fastest. Learners analyze the features of the objects that make them slow or fast.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: What a Drag
Students learn about friction and drag - two different forces that convert energy of motion to heat. Both forces can act on a moving object and decrease its velocity. Students learn examples of friction and drag, and suggest ways to...
Discovery Education
Discovery Education: Physical Science
The Discovery Channel provides numerous lesson plans dealing with the physical sciences. Content is organized by grade level, but all lesson plans include suggestions for adaptations for older or younger audiences.
Other
Mattel: Hot Wheels: Speedometry
This resource is part of a two unit curriculum designed for fourth-graders using the 5E Instructional Model (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate and Evaluate) to support students as they investigate the effect that height and other...
TryEngineering
Try Engineering: Engineering Ups and Downs
Engineering design lesson examines the principles behind working elevators. Teams of students explore how elevators work, then design, build, and evaluate their own elevator to service a toy car garage.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Changing Fields
This instructional activity begins with an activity in which students induce EMF in a coil of wire using magnetic fields. Then, demonstrations on Eddy currents show how a magnetic field can slow magnets just as Eddy currents are used to...
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Seismic Waves: How Earthquakes Move the Earth
Students learn about the types of seismic waves produced by earthquakes and how they move the Earth. The dangers of earthquakes are presented as well as the necessity for engineers to design structures for earthquake-prone areas that are...
McREL International
Mc Rel: Whelmer #9 Learning Activity: Nickel Karate
An easy to do activity that investigates the basic theories of inertia. The activity is in lesson plan format that meets NSES standards.
McREL International
Mc Rel: Whelmer #12 Learning Activity: Bernoulli Cans
An easy to do activity that investigates Bernoulli's principle. The activity is presented in lesson plan format that meets NSES standards.
McREL International
Mc Rel: Whelmer #33 Learning Activity: Density Balloon
A simple activity that investigates the effect of heat on the volume of a gas. The activity is presented in lesson plan format that meets NSES standards.
Other
Ties Magazine: Marble Mania
This lesson idea is great for the middle school student. The challenge is to construct a marble maze or marble coaster where success is based upon the slow continuous motion of the marble.
Science Buddies
Science Buddies: Teaching Engineering Design With an Egg Drop
Learners build a device to protect an egg and prevent it from breaking when dropped.
Science and Mathematics Initiative for Learning Enhancement (SMILE)
Smile: Momentum Conserved
This site by the Illinois Institute of Technology gives a Lab activity in which young scholars use a variety of toys to discover Newton's second law and momentum conservation. Newton's cradle, skate boards, and a toy motorcycle are...