Odyssey of the Mind
Odyssey of the Mind Curriculum Activity: Making of a Monster
Over the course of a week, the class will study how monsters are portrayed throughout literature. But why? Monsters in science fiction or horror often depict the darker side of human nature; they are described for their horrific physical...
Calvin Crest Outdoor School
Survival
Equip young campers with important survival knowledge with a set of engaging lessons. Teammates work together to complete three outdoor activities, which include building a shelter, starting a campfire, and finding directions in the...
Curated OER
Blubber Mittens:Adaptation to Cold Climates
Students get a first hand look at the benefit of a "blubber layer" in cold climates through a simulation using vegetable shortening and icy water. Through this simulation, students examine how adaptations help organisms survive.
Statistics Education Web
Now You SeeIt, Now You Don't: Using SeeIt to Compare Stacked Dotplots to Boxplots
How does your data stack up? A hands-on activity asks pupils to collect a set of data by measuring their right-hand reach. Your classes then analyze their data using a free online software program and make conclusions as to the...
Curated OER
Following Instructions
Designed to assess your class's ability to follow directions, this reading activity has learners split into groups, read a series of instructions, read a passage, and answer two lists of questions. Can they remember to raise their hand...
Curated OER
Do Touch!
Students explore the sense of touch. They investigate unknown solids using the sense of touch. Pupils use their senses of touch to match feely gloves. Students explore body parts, by tracing their hands and feet on paper. They create a...
Perkins School for the Blind
The Country Egg
Because most children with visual impairments don't reach and grab things at a young age the way sighted children do, they need additional supports to build up their fine motor skills. Here, they work on the pincer grasp, using their...
Disney
Renewable Energy
Bring some energy to your physical science curriculum with this engaging Bill Nye the Science Guy lesson. Based on his Renewable Energy video, students explore the concepts of potential and kinetic energy and learn how they are applied...
Novelinks
The Martian Chronicles: Double-Entry Journals
Teach learners to reflect on their reading with a lesson about double-entry journals. As they read Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, class members note interesting passages from the text on the left side of their...
Perkins School for the Blind
Handprint Art
Stimulate the senses with a handprint art project! Flake laundry detergent, water, and food coloring are mixed together to create a substance that has a pleasant smell and will dry hard and dimensional. Children with visual disabilities...
University of Nottingham
Drawing to Scale: A Garden
See how design and geometry go hand in hand. The activity asks learners to use geometry to design a backyard garden given dimensions of each feature. Scholars work with ratios and scale to develop an accurate scale drawing that includes...
Curated OER
Disney Mambo #5 Warm-up
When the music starts to play, everyone wants to get up and move to this song. Teach your class some basic steps and body moves to the beat of this mambo song. Each of the movements is repeated, which means that youngsters are not having...
Curated OER
Disguise for the Eyes
Young scientists discover how many, many animals use color as a way of helping them to survive in the wild. They understand how animals use color in their everyday lives. Pupils engage in hands-on activities, watch videos, access...
Teach Engineering
Things That Matter to Flocculants
How does the dirt get out of your drinking water? A hands-on activity introduces the use of flocculants to help clear solid particles out of water. The plan walks learners through the process of setting up an experiment that...
Asian Art Museum
Japanese Architecture for Elementary School Students
Art and architecture go hand-in-hand. Kids watch clips from the Hayo Miyazaki film Spirited Away to better understand Japanese customs and architecture. The discussion questions included are very good, and will help you lead the class in...
Serendip
DNA Structure, Function and Replication
Before a cell replicates, its DNA must replicate. Take advantage of a hands-on guided lesson plan to teach budding scientists how this happens. Using a set of nucleotide cards, learners become the DNA and work to create matching strands...
PBS
Code Creators
The lesson is real—even if the computer code isn't. Scholars learn about pseudocode, which simulates computer code using everyday language. They write pseudocode for simple actions, then have classmates guess the action from the written...
Achieve3000
Oral Reading Fluency
Accuracy, phrasing, flow, and pace, the four traits of of oral reading fluency, are the focus of a series of exercises that are designed to help readers develop these comprehension and literacy skills.
Curated OER
Terrific Traveling Tour
Fifth graders discover the career of a museum curator as they assemble mock museum displays and gather information on famous works of art. The lesson is very complete and includes lesson extensions, resource links, and curricular...
Curated OER
Editing Marks, Part 1
Dander from the show Twisted Whiskers and characters from My Little Pony are featured in this three part lesson plan that explores using story pyramids to scaffold ideas, adding sensory details to enrich writing, and editing using common...
Curated OER
Take a Stab!
Your geology class practices taking core samples of a potato to examine the stratigraphy. This is a terrific modeling lesson that helps youngsters visualize strata that cannot be seen from the surface of the ground. The directions...
Curated OER
Introduce Vocabulary: Airport (Barton)
This vocabulary-in-context strategy can be applied to any book that learners read with you; however the activity here is designed around Byron Byrton's fiction book, Airplane. First, introduce the new words you will learn: attendant,...
Illustrative Mathematics
Counting by Tens
With this daily counting activity, your kindergartners will master counting in sequence automatically from 0 to 100, and will count in multiples of ten to 100. With the whole class, count to 100. With each number, learners will whisper...
Curated OER
The Art of Science: Glitter Bottles and Oobleck
After having a class discussion on the three states of matter, young scientists utilize the wonderful substance, Oobleck in order to experience something that changes states of matter. They also create "sparkle jars" which...