Students explore Newton's laws, including what they state, and what the intuitive meaning is of the first and third laws.

Fifth graders discuss ways to move large rocks. They relate this to building a rock garden, and the ways people might load boulders into a truck. Students discuss the use of a ramp vs. lifting the boulder straight up onto the bed of the...

Third graders study and define force. They determine that the cause of movement is pushing or pulling which are the types of force used when operating simple machines. They experiment to determine which object requires the most amount of...

Students describe the properties of solids and liquids, and explain how a semiconductor works.  For this atom lesson students demonstrate the bonding properties of carbon and silicon.

Using a hands-on approach, learners explore the effect of friction on objects. Learners use toy cars, shoes, wood, metal, and more to experiment with the causes and effects of friction. Afterwards, they conduct experiments in which they...

Students experiment with potential and kinetic energy. They design a device that will toss a ball at least 30 centimeters, catch it and to the ball up again.

Eighth graders engage in a variety of activities in order to investigate the basic concepts of physics. They read and answer questions in a written text. This is only one type of activity that is part of many others.

Students explore the relationship between magnetism and electricity byby explaining how the model motor operates. They observe the the spinning of a coil of copper wire that is part of a circuit.

What kind of pears do electricians eat? Amperes! Presentation begins with electric field vectors for various charge configurations and field strengths for both point charges and uniform fields. It continues with various surfaces,...

Perform an activity on performance testing with a lesson focused on the purpose of wheel bearings on skateboards. Learners conduct performance testing on a skateboard to collect and interpret data.

What does it cost to keep the lights on? Through a hands-on activity, class members use a watt meter and determine the amount of energy different types of light bulbs use. The class then determines the financial and environmental...

How does the soda clerk know exactly how to get the glass across the counter to the customer? Pupils use the simulation to adjust the launch velocity, glass weight, base area, surface material, and the customer's position to answer...

Discover the connection between electric current and magnets. Scholars create electromagnets by passing a magnet through a coil. They experiment with different materials to determine the variables that affect the strength of the current.

Make an impact on young physicists with this fun collection of resources. After first watching a video and taking notes on the physics of car crashes, students go on to complete a series of activities that explore the...

Individuals design and build a set of shock absorbers to protect their astronauts when they land. Using a limited amount of supplies, pupils build a system that will keep two large marshmallows from flying out of a cup when it lands...

One way to identify possible volcanic activity on other planets is by testing the planet for magnetism. A science lesson begins with pupils constructing their own planet from a dead battery, magnets, paper, and tape before labeling...

In this energy worksheet, students read about the discoveries of Galileo and how different philosophers contributed to our understanding of energy. Then students complete 4 short answer questions.

Pupils investigate the connection between work, potential energy, kinetic energy, and heat. In this physics lesson, students use pulleys to produce mechanical advantages and incline planes to demonstrate energy conversion.

Students simulate a meeting of the President's energy task force in order to observe how energy policy may be developed with the input of various groups. Students will form groups with the following roles: lobbyists, members of the...

Young scholars describe how to recognize a force, define balanced and net forces, state Newton's first law of motion, explain why friction works, state Newton's second Law of Motion, and explain why the direction of force is important.

Students conduct an experiment to find out how well different wires radiate heat when voltage is applied across the wire. They use the results of their experiments to consider how the gauge of the wire and the type of wire affect the...

In this alternative energy resources learning exercise, learners read and describe the advantages to using tidal power. Then they identify and list some of the disadvantages to using tidal power as mentioned in the brief excerpt read....

Students see that energy is everywhere in nature - in the light of the sun, in wind, in falling water and erupting volcanoes. Without energy, there is no life. This lesson provides many good ideas across the curriculum to study energy.

Learners calculate the potential energy of a glider, the kinetic energy of a moving glider and the change in velocity when potential energy changes to kinetic energy.