Due to the isolation of seamounts, their biodiversity offers a great deal of information on the development of biological and physical processes. Pupils use simple cluster analysis to rate the similarity and differences in biological...

Surf's up, big kahunas! How do surfers know when the big waves will appear? They use science! Over the course of five days, dive in to the inner workings of tidal waves and learn to predict sea levels with the moon as your guide.

What happens when ice melts? Well ... water happens. When that melting ice is a glacier, the amount of water that results produces change throughout the world. Middle school science sleuths uncover the truth about global...

Sometimes scientists learn more from unexpected findings than from routine analysis! Junior oceanographers dive deep to explore hydrothermal vent communities in the fourth lesson in a series of five. Scholars examine data and look for...

Get a detailed look at plate tectonics with a 14-slide presentation that highlights the Earth's layers, continental drift, seafloor spreading, the theory of plate tectonics, and boundary types. Each slide provides thorough...

When the sun's rays can't reach the producers in a food web, where does all the energy come from? Extreme environments call for extreme food sources. Young scientists investigate creatures that appear to get their energy from methane...

How is sea coral like a thermometer? Part three of a six-part series from NOAA describes how oceanographers can use coral growth to estimate water temperature over time. Life science pupils manipulate data to determine the age of corals...

Practice comparing and contrasting details in informational text with a reading passage about whales. It explains the ways that fish and whales are similar, as well as the ways they are different, and specific characteristics of various...

To get the word out that the Great Pacific garbage patch (GPGP) contains millions of pounds of non-biodegrading plastics, individuals research the GPGP and write an article for a newsletter. Researchers present their facts in a...

Can turning on the television lead to toxins in the food supply? The lesson offers an opportunity for young scientists to complete guided research. A worksheet lists each question as well as the web page necessary to answer the question....

When studying artifacts, especially tools, how do archaeologists determine what the devices were used for? In what ways might researchers' previous experiences influence their perception of an artifact? An article about researchers'...

Youngsters find these common sea plants and animals using a worksheet. Each of the plants and animals has a colorful representation on the worksheet. There is an answer key at the bottom of the worksheet that has all of plant and animals...

Here is a colorful worksheet which requires young ornothologists to correctly identify 16 birds by matching them up with their name which appears at the bottom of the worksheet. Each of the birds has an accurate and colorful picture...

Students set up working models demonstrating lake turnover and the formation of deep water masses in the oceans.

Explore works of art with your class by engaging them in a variety of artistic activities including papier-mache sculpture, poetry, performance, and more. After viewing and discussing four paintings of the sea by Robert Harris, learners...

Tropical fish are a great subject for any art project, they are colorful, interesting, and can go along with under water themed stories read in class, learner written narratives, or Marine Biology units. This set of instructions will...

Students explore salt and fresh water. In this water instructional activity, students investigate the amount of Earth covered by water. Students compare the amounts of salt water to fresh water. Students create a visual representation to...

In small groups, energy engineers research and make a topographic map of a marine natural resource. They report to the rest of the class pros and cons of extracting their assigned resource. The two activities may take up to four class...

Students produce a high tide. In this Marine Biology instructional activity, students visit a tide pool to investigate the creatures response to changes in the tide. Students discuss the results of their experimentation.

A website links you to several water cycle worksheets geared toward an upper elementary or middle school level. Diagrams, word search, crossword, and fill-in-the-blank worksheets are available. As an added bonus, there are links to...

A more thorough presentation on coastal systems would be difficult to find! Detailed diagrams illuminate the offshore, shoreface, foreshore, and backshore zones of  beach. The sources and movement of sediments along the coastline...

It's not long, but it's thorough! This PowerPoint takes 4th - 8th grade earth scientists deeper into the oceans. They learn about tide and current activity and the forces that drive them. They also discover how wind and the rotation of...

Here is a handy guide for putting together a research report on birds, or on a selection of other topics (see the added materials.). Individuals are guided to think of three questions about their topic, they narrow down subtopics, use a...

Students experiment with different salinities of water using straws and different colors of water. They collect and interpret data from the experiment.