New York State Education Department
TASC Transition Curriculum: Workshop 1
Work out your core, Common Core State Standards, through the first workshop in a series of 15 designed for educators. Inquiry-based activities designed for all content areas and grade levels explore the shifts to new standards,...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Human Skin Color: Evidence for Selection
Skin color is controlled by at least six genes. Young scientists learn about skin colors through a documentary. They discuss the topics of pigment, natural selection, and vitamin D absorption. They apply their knowledge to higher order...
Curated OER
Vocabulary Words Kindergarten
Improve your kindergartners' math and science vocabulary with flash cards and word walls. Based on the vocabulary in the Common Core standards, the cards use illustrations to show the meanings of many math terms and descriptions.
Curated OER
Science TV: Making it Real
Students explore the ways science is presented in a children's television show. Students conduct internet research, and then create and design a skit that highlights the problem-solving process.
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Physics at the Art Museum: Kinetic Energy, Potential Energy, and Work
Connect science, math, and art for a true interdisciplinary lesson! Learners explore simple machines in art. Through analysis with a physics app, they identify positions of kinetic and potential energy and make conclusions about work.
National Math + Science Initative
Reading an Informational Text: "It All Started with Sputnik"
Sputnik was one of the greatest scientific advancements of the 1950s, and this reading lesson does it justice. Pupils start off with pre-reading questions and a video. They then read an excerpt from an article, which is accompanied by...
BioEd Online
Butterflies in Space
How does gravity affect the life cycle of a butterfly? Learn first-hand what types of investigations astronauts perform in space by following along with one of NASA's experiments. Create butterfly habitats in the classroom with specific...
National Park Service
Rock Ranking
Junior geologists sort rocks and soil. They separate a sample of river gravel by size, shape, color, and other characteristics. To include Common Core standards, you could have little ones graph the number of particles in each sample.
National Math + Science Initative
Moon Watch: The Tides of War
What role did astronomy play in the liberation of France during World War II? Bring literacy and history into science with a cross-curricular lesson plan that examines the importance of weather stations and moon phases in the invasion of...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Winogradsky Columns: Microbial Ecology in the Classroom
Winogradsky columns are ideal for observing the role of bacteria and other microorganisms in an ecosystem. This student activity guide is complete with data tables for observations and analysis questions for processing what was observed....
West Contra Costa Unified School District
Scientific Method Mania
Horrible science puns only happen periodically, but the scientific method is forever. Young scientists observe two presentations on the scientific method, complete independent practice worksheets, and integrate their knowledge through a...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Ocean Acidification
Human impacts on the environment can sometimes be difficult to measure, especially under water! An activity centered on ocean acidification gives science scholars the opportunity to examine the effects of carbon dioxide on marine life....
Texas State Energy Conservation Office
Investigation: Splitting Atoms
In a simple activity, physical scientists model nuclear fission using a droplet of oil. This can be used alone in a unit on different types of energy, or as part of the energy conservation unit produced by the Texas State Energy...
Prince William Network
The Incredible Journey
Divide your school gym into breeding grounds and non-breeding grounds so that your zoologists can play a game simulating the seasonal migration of shorebirds. Players pick one of the included game cards and follow its directions, which...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Radio Reception and Transmission
After reading about radio transmission, application, and the difference between AM and FM, small teams of engineers use a kit to construct an FM radio and then send and receive broadcasts. This is an ideal activity for middle school STEM...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Arduino Blink Challenge
Emerging engineers read about Arduino software and how it can be used. Then they follow a nine-step tutorial to connect an Arduino board to a computer and put it to work! The objective is to code a program that will cause an LED to...
Michigan State University
All About Insects
Insects are the focus of an activity that looks deep into the anatomy and metamorphosis of everyday bugs. Two worksheets reinforce knowledge obtained through a teacher-guided grand conversation and insect observation.
Curated OER
"Polly"gon Pockets
Explore polygons with your elementary learners. Divide the class in 12 to configure the polygon puzzle before them. They list the attributes of each type of polygon they see, and if there's time, they jump on the interactive website...
EngageNY
Grade 9 ELA Module 4, Unit 1, Lesson 22
Class members read "Satyagraha," the concluding section of Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos' Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science, and analyze how the authors support their claim that terrible...
New York State Education Department
TASC Transition Curriculum: Workshop 13
The six instructional shifts in this workshop definitely move math and science teachers' understanding of instruction. The workshop, 13th out of a series of 15, asks participants to examine sample tests and to look at how the six...
Curated OER
Phase Changes of Water
A micro-unit on the phase changes of water includes three laboratory activities. Junior scientists compare the densities of ice and water, and then they do the same for cold and warm water. They examine freezing and boiling temperatures....
Curated OER
Can Scientists Discover a Limit to Discovery?
Is there anything left to discover? Evaluate opposing sides of the debate regarding whether or not there is a future for scientific discovery. Middle and high schoolers assess quotations from the articles included to evaluate claims and...
Curated OER
Plant Parts We Eat
I bet the kids in your class will love to eat their vegetables after an engaging instructional activity about edible plants. They read information about vegetables and edible plants, sort vocabulary words, identify plant parts, measure...
Curated OER
Word Roots 7: Spect, Sta, Vert Intermediate-Crossword
Given the clues, can you complete the crossword puzzle for words containing the Latin roots spect, sta, and vert? No word list is given, but using the answer sheet, you can provide your class with the list of words to choose from. This...