University of Minnesota
Beautiful Brain: Do You See What I See?
Can art play tricks on your eyes, and can a still painting really appear to vibrate? The second lesson in a four-part series discusses the way our beautiful brains translate visual images. It highlights the style of optical art and...
University of Minnesota
Beautiful Brain: Brain Inspiration
"Neuroscientists consider Cajal as important to their discipline as Einstein is to physics." The first of four lessons has scholars view Santiago Ramon y Cajal's drawings of neurons. They reflect and respond to the art through writing...
American Chemical Society
Development of Baking Powder
Did you know baking powder can be used to treat acne, whiten teeth, and make sugar cookies? The lesson on the development of baking powder is ready-to-go with no preparation required. Through readings, pupils answer questions, complete...
American Chemical Society
The Discovery of Fullerenes
Carbon is the most common element on earth, so the innovative discovery of a new type of carbon molecule won the 1996 Nobel Prize. In the ready-to-go lesson, scholars learn about C60 and how it has opened up the entire area of...
American Chemical Society
Isolation of Phytochrome
Why do soybean plants that are planted weeks apart in the spring mature simultaneously in the fall? Four independent activities cover the history of phytochrome research, scientist collaboration, the electromagnetic spectrum, and...
Curated OER
Working with Willows
Students explore their sense of touch and discover why the sense of touch is important to us and to how we observe and identify our world.
Curated OER
Exploring Mars
Learners, working in small groups construct scale models of the planets and solar system. They examine images of Mars and discuss what might have caused the features. They record facts about their planetary research in their journals and...
Salt River Project
How Do We Clean Polluted Water?
How do we clean up oil spills and other pollutants in the water? Explore water treatment strategies with a set of environmental science experiments. Groups remove oil from water, work with wastewater treatment, and perform a water...
National Library of Medicine
Your Environment, Your Health: The Great Debate—Bottled Water vs. Tap Water in Our School
Should bottled water be sold in schools, or should they only provide tap water? The summative unit in the six-part series encourages scholars debating this topic. The lessons teach how to build an argument, how to gain background...
NOAA
Ocean Layers I
How is it possible for ocean water to have layers? The sixth installment of a 23-part NOAA Enrichment in Marine sciences and Oceanography (NEMO) program investigates factors that cause different water densities to occur. Experiments...
Curated OER
Selecting a Harbor: Oceanography and the Impact of Oil Spills
Students work together to determine a new site for a harbor. Using the Internet, they research the impact of an oil spill on the oceans and wildlife. They present their findings to the class and a solution to the problem.
Curated OER
Energy in Today's Global Society
Students explain how heat is used to generate and produce electricity. In this energy lesson plan students complete several activities that show them about the different fuels used for heating.
Curated OER
Seed Growth
Students develop an independent procedure to investigate the germination of two types of seeds. Students must construct data tables or charts to record observations and results, graph the data, and analyze the data.
Curated OER
Friction Force
Students investigate friction force on a variety of objects such as bricks and cardboard boxes. They use a force probe to collect data on the changes in force required to drag the objects across a variety of surface types.
Curated OER
Barometer Investigation
Students construct a barometer to use in an experiment that they design to measure the air pressure on a daily basis. These observations of air pressure allow students to determine how weather is affected when a storm is approaching and...
Curated OER
Pond-water Populations
Young scholars design and conduct and experiment on algae, for a two week period, to answer the question "In your investigation, how does changing one factor affect the growth of organisms?"
Curated OER
Insulators
Students design and carry out an investigation to test which materials is the best insulator: they predict which way heat energy flows in a system and analyze the flow of energy in a system from one point to another and from one form to...
Curated OER
Stimulus/Response in Invertebrates
Students design and conduct and experiment to determine how invertebrates react to an outside stimulus such as light and other stimuli. Student must develop a clear plan of action, collect data in an organized manner and analyze their...
Curated OER
What is Sound? How Can We Change Sound?
In this instructional activity, students investigate the phenomenon of sound! Students compare and contrast how sound travels through solids, liquids, and gases. They explain how length and thickness affect sound. Students know the...
Curated OER
Observations and Inferences
Students observe how to distinguish observations form inferences. In this examining inferences lesson students list observations relating to the activity and discuss the importance of them.
Curated OER
Water-holding Capacity of Earth Materials
Students design and conduct an experiment to test their ideas about how to speed up or slow down the rate of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction. They have access to an array of physical and chemical factors that might influence enzyme...
Curated OER
How Effective is Perspiration at Cooling?
Students collect data on the cooling of water in two different test tubes, one that is wrapped in wet newspaper and one in dry newspaper. They then relate this cooling effect to the body's perspiration.
Curated OER
A Cut Above the Rest Administration Procedures
Students analyze how the Law of Conservation of Energy applies to the design and use of scissors. Working in groups, they determine the output work for a standard pair of scissors.
Curated OER
Are Enzymes Specific for Their Substrates?
Students discover enzyme to substrate specificity. The experiment uses samples of glucose and lactose in combination with the enzyme lactase. Students observe the reaction between the lactose and the lactase; the lack of a reaction...