Helping the Body Build Strong Bones

Being an astronaut takes not only high mental acuity, but also a high level of physical fitness, especially for those who spend a long amount of time away from Earth, such as the astronauts serving on the International Space Station....

What is meant by the phrase "form follows function?" Allow your budding biologists to discover first-hand through two activities. In the first, groups work together to discover whether a solid cylinder or an empty cylinder can support...

Planning a unit on simple machines? Save some time and energy with this collection of lessons and activities that explores how these devices are used in the real world to make life a little easier. 

What do brown bears in Alaska's Katmai National Park need to survive? Pupils explore the unique habitats, diet, and survival needs of this animal. They predict the consequences of removing any integral part of the bear's survival, and...

Too much material will weigh you down. The sixth segment in a series of 22 highlights how weight affects a plane. Pupils learn that engineers take the properties of materials, including weight, when designing something. 

You don't need a scale to determine weight. This activity provides a way to use the concepts of air pressure and surface area to determine the weight of a vehicle by calculating the amount of weight each tire supports.

Learners explore the function of bone, muscle, and skin. Pasta and rubber bands are used to model how minerals and collagen contribute to bone strength. The effects of the reduction of these substances are explored in chicken bones.

Bend it, but don't break it. Groups investigate the strength of different materials. Using a procedure in the seventh segment of a 22-part series on aviation, pupils determine how far a rod will bend. They determine the strength-to-mass...

Students explore mass, volume, and weight. For this science and measurement lesson, students compare volume, mass, and weight after listening to the teacher's description of each. Students explore different scales and balances and...

Students measure the weight of a container of leaves daily to discover how quickly it grows lighter as the foliage dries.