Rocking the Boat

Even though the student handouts are not included in the write-up, this lesson plan contains the instructions for terrific activities to use when teaching middle schoolers about metamorphic rocks. First, they compare granite to gneiss...

Scholars review prior knowledge before completing a hands-on simulation of the rock cycle. They write stories or songs summarizing their simulations to demonstrate mastery.

It's better to burn out than fade away! Viewers experience the birth of neutron stars and supernovae in a video that explains the life cycle of high mass stars. Learners see the conditions needed to produce these events, as well as...

Have some physical science fun when studying the center of gravity or center of mass. Simply have balancing artists stand a dowel on one finger and keep it from falling over! A lump of clay is added and moved up along the dowel over a...

How can a teeter-totter balance when the two people are different sizes? Show classes how this works through a simulation. Scholars play with a teeter-totter to show how different masses and their placement affect balance. Once they have...

Time is growing short. Teams work together to identify physical properties of rocks in order to determine the properties that would best suit their cavern shelter design.

A simple activity goes a long way in demonstrating the property of porosity to your rock hounds. They will mass a specimen of dry sandstone and then soak it in a pre-measured amount of water. After seven minutes, they once again measure...

This short video simply explains the Conservation of Mass with graphics that show the atoms being conserved in pictures of balanced equations. The connection between mass and energy is explained and Einstein's energy equation is mentioned.

What better way is there to introduce conservation of mass than a few simple experiments? Young chemists conduct two chemical reactions, take the masses of reactants and products, then compare their results to determine...

Juvenile geologists drill clear plastic straws down into a playdough sedimentary rock model, pulling out sample rock cores. As they analyze their cores, they apply the law of superposition and discover that originally horizontal layers...