From play pumps that provide clean water to shoes made from trash, innovators change the world one invention at a time. After researching various inventions, young entrepreneurs develop their own. Extension opportunities include prompts...

Technology—what exactly is it? Find out with a project designed to inspire the inner inventor in us all. The activity begins with a captivating podcast and a search of multiple websites that display different inventions and technology,...

Leonardo da Vinci is the focus of a hands-on activity that encourages scholars to become inventors. Pupils brainstorm and sketch their idea, compose a detailed depiction using a mirror writing technique, and antique the paper for a...

After getting to know the inventor, Leonardo da Vinci and his many inventions, scholars think up their own invention. Following a written description and a hand-drawn picture, learners use a method of mirror writing and antiquing to give...

Motion is the focus of ten hands-on activities that challenge scholars to build machines invented by Leonardo da Vinci. Following several steps, small groups work collaboratively to recreate machines including levers, pulleys, wheels,...

Watch lightbulbs go off in learners' heads as they look at a patent for Thomas Edison's most famous invention. After examining the light bulb patent, young historians speculate on how the invention changed life in the 1880s and its...

A Reading Adventure pack focuses on the invention of flight. After reading a fiction and nonfiction book, scholars take their newfound knowledge to design a one-passenger flying device, experiment with different types of paper airplanes...

It's no small wonder that a lightbulb has come to represent a bright idea. The light bulb, the bright idea of Thomas Edison, was just one of his over 1,000 inventions. A teacher's guide introduces young audiences to works of the man who...

When you hear Leonardo da Vinci mentioned, chances are that you think of the Mona Lisa, or flying machines—but what about plastic? Learners blend heavy cream and vinegar over heat to replicate da Vinci's early organic plastic recipe.

The choice is simple: create a PowerPoint presentation, write a book, or invent a compound machine. Whichever project your young scientists choose, they will be engaged in creatively demonstrating their knowledge of simple...

What would change in your daily life due to a power outage? Here, learners explore the inventions brought to us by the one and only, Thomas Edison, and imagine a day without them. Scholars take part in a grand conversation and write a...

Research the life of Alexander Graham Bell in groups, identifying the challenges Alexander Graham Bell faced before he invented the telephone. To end the lesson plan, use construction paper to make models of an old fashioned telephone.

Barbed wire may have made cattle farming easier, but it brought to an end the free-roaming days of the plains. No longer could Native American groups continue their nomadic lifestyle, and the days of cowboys herding large groups of...

In this activity, children can let their imaginations fly when they create fanciful inventions to make their pets' lives easier or more fun.

Humans love to communicate and they do it in so many different ways. The class investigates how people have used new inventions and technological innovations to communicate. They are divided into groups of three or four and given...

Filippo Brunelleschi's invention of linear perspective during the Renaissance was further developed by his apprentice, a young artist named Leonardo da Vinci. Now modern artists can give da Vinci's famous perspectograph a try...

The printing process was a technological innovation that revolutionized the modern world. Your learners with visual impairments can experience this process by creating a print by using letterpress printing. They use cardboard, glue, and...

What effect could one person's invention have on the human race? In the case of the Neolithic Agricultural Revolution, small improvements in farming methods led to increased food production. The human population began to boom, leading us...

What's the best way to learn the elements of the periodic table? The inventions of Thomas Edison? Patience? To prepare for the performance task assessment on how people learn, class members share ideas about ways to learn in a variety of...

What better way for young biologists to learn about invertebrates than by creating their very own? Here, students are assigned a set of invertebrate characteristics and are asked to invent an imaginary ocean animal...

Stephen Perry invented and patented the modern rubber band in 1845. Young scientists put his discovery to work as they use rubber bands to observe entropy and enthalpy. They determine the change in free energy to figure out if it...

Music is the focus of the reading adventure pack. After reading, pupils complete hands-on activities. Scholars use household items to make shakers and cymbals. They listen to eclectic music by turning on the radio, borrowing music from...

A Reading Adventure pack explores the busy life of bees. After reading a fiction and nonfiction text, scholars complete three hands-on activities. Participants invent a robot that can do the work of bees, cheers to hardworking bees with...

Wrap up the unit in one final design. Pairs use their knowledge of aviation to design new flying machines and record how their designs take into consideration the forces that act upon airplanes. The pupils determine whether their designs...