Curated OER
Indoor Air Quality
Students make a work puzzle using air quality vocabulary. In this air quality vocabulary lesson, students design a word puzzle using a teacher designated number of vocabulary words. They peer edit the puzzles with their classmates.
Curated OER
Understanding the Indoor Environment: Word Walls
Students study vocabulary words about indoor air quality. In this indoor environment lesson, students create a word wall with vocabulary words about indoor air quality and pollutants.
Curated OER
Conserving Energy Resources
Seventh graders research on energy conversion. After they have researched several types of energy resources, teams of two to four create posters which depict how these resources can be conserved.
Curated OER
Warm and Toasty
Students are introduced to the concepts of specific heat and heat capacity. In groups, they design an experiment to test these two topics on various fabrics. They compare and contrast the amount of heat loss on the different materials...
Curated OER
Harvesting Oil from the Earth
Fourth graders research sources of fossil fuels especially oil while determining how scientists take core samples from an Earth model. They look at oil consumption and production in the US and throughout the world.
Curated OER
Strawkets and Thrust
Students investigate the effect of thrust on rocket flight. They construct two paper rockets, one with a smaller exit nozzle, and compare/contrast the distances traveled by the rockets.
Curated OER
Sky and Cloud Windows
Young scholars monitor the weather, clouds, and sky. In this weather lesson, students create a sky and cloud window to focus their sky observations. They write observations in a notebook and include the date, time, cloud cover, types of...
Curated OER
Energy Production
Students examine the role of energy in our daily lives, and how energy is produced. Students discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each energy resource, and the controversy surrounding the use of nuclear energy.
Curated OER
Energy Production
Middle schoolers examine the role of energy in our daily lives, and how energy is produced. Students discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each energy resource, and the controversy surrounding the use of nuclear energy.
Curated OER
A River Ran Through It
Students research how water is used to generate electricity. They investigate water's potential-to-kinetic energy transfer in hands-on activities about falling water and waterwheels. They take measurements, calculate averages and graph...
Curated OER
Solar Power
Students discover how engineers use solar energy to heat buildings. They investigate the thermal properties of different materials. They evaluate the usefulness of each material.
Curated OER
What's down there?
young scholars analyze how oil is formed and where in the Earth we find it. Students take a core sample to look for oil in a model of the Earth. They analyze their sample and make an informed decision as to whether or not they should...
Curated OER
Learn to Build a Rocket in 5 Days or Your Money Back
Students discover the entire process that goes into designing a rocket for any customer. They study important factors such as supplies, ethics, deadlines and budgets. Also, students explore about the Engineering process, and recognize...
Curated OER
Waterwheel Work
Students investigate the history of the waterwheel and common uses for water turbines today. They construct an experimental waterwheel using a two-liter plastic bottle, measure the rate of revolution of a waterwheel, and complete a...
Curated OER
Locating Vent Fields Using CTD Data
Students describe the way hydrothermal vents work. Students work on locating vent regions through remote collection of data about water temperature and density. Comparing density and temperatures graphs, students search for indicators...
Curated OER
How Long Does Trash Last
Students work in cooperative groups to estimate how long trash lasts in a landfill. They study environmental consequences of not recycling and use graph-making software to create a graph that illustrates the lifespan of trash items...
Curated OER
Solids, Liquids, and Gases
First graders explore the properties of matter. In this states of matter lesson plan, 1st graders conduct scientific investigations that require them to mix, cool, and heat objects in order to observe changes in the properties of matter.
Curated OER
Visual Models of Solutions and Concentrations
Students model solutions with beakers of colored glass or plastic spheres. In this solutions lesson, students use beakers of colored spheres to represent pure substances. They mix the spheres to demosntrate solutions. They discuss...
Curated OER
Tree Identification
Students list four ways to identify trees. In this tree identification instructional activity, students use tree identification techniques such as leafs, bark, wood grain, soil type, and climate to create tables and graphs.
Curated OER
How Things Fly
Students research the mechanics of flight and create a slideshow with one slide dedicated to each of these topics: lift, drag, thrust, and weight. They create a short quiz regarding the material that they presented and give it to their...
Curated OER
Our Solar System
Third graders describe the composition of our solar system. They recognize the names of the planets in our solar system and compare and contrast the nine planets that orbit the sun.
Curated OER
Classifying Matter
Second graders conduct investigations to explore matter. In this states of matter activity, 2nd graders complete four activities to analyze the three states of matter. Students analyze the properties of solids, liquids, and gases....
Curated OER
Using Star Charts and Maps
Students study star charts and describe locations of objects. For this scientific models lesson students use coordinates and identify characteristics.
Curated OER
Population Dynamics
Middle schoolers discover how organisms are dependent on one another for survivial. They also discuss how to conserve natural resources. They compare and contrast the different types of symbiotic relationships as well.