Classics for Kids
"Mars" from The Planets
Gustav Holst's The Planets provide young musicians an opportunity to examine how composers can create a suite: a collection of smaller pieces grouped to explore a single topic. After listening to "Jupiter," they examine "Mars" in...
Curated OER
"Fossil" of a Carbonized Plant
Students use leaves to make model of a carbonized plant and classify leaves by shape and margin type.
Novelinks
Touching Spirit Bear: Question Answer Response Strategy
What types of questions help readers learn the most? Sixth, seventh, and eighth graders learn how to ask four types of questions from the Question Answer Response (QAR) reading strategy to help grow their comprehension of Touching Spirit...
NOAA
Vertebrates II
Mammals of the ocean unite! Or not. The 20th installment of a 23-part NOAA Enrichment in Marine sciences and Oceanography (NEMO) program investigates how warm-blooded marine mammals survive in water. In the class activity, learners use...
Curated OER
Lesson Plan for C.S Lewis’ The Magician’s Nephew
Here is a lesson that incorporates music writing, and reading literature. The class reads chapter eight from the C.S. Lewis classic The Magician's Nephew. Then, just like in the story, they use music as inspiration to create (write)...
Polar Trec
Arctic Smorgasbord!
Two blooms of phytoplankton, instead of just one, now occur in the Arctic due to declining sea ice, which will have widespread effects on the marine life and climate. In small groups, participants build an Arctic food web with given...
Curated OER
Animals and Engineering
Students study animal classification and their interactions. In this animals and engineering lesson students study animal communities and how engineers use this knowledge to create new technologies.
Curated OER
Species Diversity in Ecosystems with Different Techniques of Land Management
Students visit numerous places to help in their understanding of Ecology. In this biology lesson plan, students will learn about characteristics and how to identify numerous plants and animals. This lesson plan allows for many field trip...
PBS
Predicting/Making a Hypothesis
Students analyze information from a variety of sources in order to create a hypothesis about the origin of an interesting family artifact.They create alternative hypotheses based upon available information to demonstrate that some...
Curated OER
Classification and Identification
Students, after exploring and analyzing diagrammatic and taxonomic keys and their association to marine sciences, identify and classify objects and organisms based on visual attributes/characteristics. They research and create their own...
Curated OER
The World of Insects and Spiders
Students identify numerous insects and their body parts. In this insect life lesson, students practice using scientific vocabulary while comparing the different parts of spiders and insects. Students view several videos...
Curated OER
Houghton Mifflin Social Studies/Chapter 13, Lesson 1 The Past Shapes the Future (pp. 292-295)
Fourth graders reflect upon the events of the past in order to make cognitive connections to present or future history. Students use Blooms Taxonomy to attain higher levels of thinking.
Curated OER
Science: Criminalistics - A New Look at Crime
Students examine the world of forensic science, focusing on fingerprint analysis. In the instructional activity, they implement a method by which fingerprints of class members are categorized and identified. Elementary students study...
Curated OER
Science: Classifying the Planets
Eighth graders, in pairs, use pasta, rice, and prior knowledge of the planets to construct multi-stage classification systems. While examining the bags of pasta and rice, they note the similarities and differences of the nine planets. ...
Curated OER
The Animals Kingdom
Students are introduced to the classification system of animals. In groups, they set up an aquarium in which they must maintain throughout the year. They also observe earthworms and how they react to various stimuli and research the...
NASA
Mystery Planet
What can one learn about a planet based on a small surface sample? Learners will explore artifacts from a mystery planet and see what they can determine about the planet based on the evidence in front of them.
ARKive
Species Discovery
How many of your students know that even today new species are being found all over the globe? Introduce them to the amazing diversity our planet houses with a creative activity about animal variation and classification. They'll use a...
ARKive
Species Discovery
How do you classify a newly discovered species? Learners view a presentation and complete research about biodiversity and the classification hierarchy. The lesson includes activities with dichotomous keys and work on classifying both...
Curated OER
Species and Specimens: Exploring Local Biodiversity
Students practice skills essential to all scientific investigation: carefully observing and collecting data. They become field biologists in a series of hands-on activities to collect and identify specimens, and survey and calculate the...
Curated OER
What's The Big Deal About Accutane?
Young scholars take on the role of epidemiologists. They investigate an "outbreak" in serious birth defects that occur in infants born to teenage girls. students discover a link between the use of the acne drug called Accutane and birth...
Curated OER
Emulsion_ Compulsion
Students experiment with common household products to determine the properties of emulsions and how they fit into the classifications of matter through this series of lessons.
Curated OER
Invertebrate Classification
Students discuss the recent disovery of the "furry lobster" to peak interest in the animal kingdom. They classify various speciments using invertebrate dichotomous keys, identifying major animal phyla and classes. Thy the complete the...
Curated OER
Palm use in Astronomy
Students identify and recall common constellations by using a palm pilot with astronomy software. Students will use their Palm to assist them in correctly identifying constellations using a telescope.
Curated OER
Palm Use in Biology
Students view bacteria through a microscope. They draw and label the bacteria using microbiology software loaded onto their Palms.