Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Wright Again: 100 Years of Flight

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Aspiring aeronautical engineers demonstrate different forces as they construct and test paper airplanes. This lesson plan links you to a website that models the most effective paper airplane design, an animation describing the forces...
Lesson Plan
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1
Teach Engineering

May the Force Be with You: Weight

For Teachers 5th - 7th Standards
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. 
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Graphing the Four Forces

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Using the Cartesian coordinate system, future flight experts plot points to determine whether or not an airplane will fly. With the four forces of weight, lift, drag, and thrust represented in different quadrants, your physics learners...
Worksheet
Curated OER

Understanding the Four Forces of Flight

For Students 4th - 5th
In this four forces of flight worksheet, students read a 1 page article on flights, answer 5 questions with multiple choice answers, draw a line to connect the four forces to their definitions and answer 1 short answer scenario.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Flight

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Students are introduced to the four forces of flight--drag, lift, thrust, and weight--through a variety of fun-filled flight experiments. They "fly" for short periods and evaluate factors that might either increase or decrease their...
Lesson Plan
1
1
Teach Engineering

May the Force Be With You: Lift

For Teachers 5th - 7th
Get the class up and going with a lesson that discusses how airplane wings provide lift. Pupils use their knowledge of Bernoulli's Principle to develop an explanation of how it creates lift on airplane wings.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Strawkets and Weight

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students investigate the effect that weight has on rocket flight. They construct a variety of straw-launched rockets that have different weights, observe what happens when the weight of a rocket is altered by reducing its physical size...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Principles Of Flight: Wings That Spin

For Teachers K - 1st
Students discover how flight is possible.  For this physics lesson, students investigate the properties of a blimp and gyro-copter, comparing rotating wings and fixed wings of aircraft.  Students create their own model aircraft...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Four Forces of Flight

For Teachers K - 12th
Learners explore the four forces of flight. They investigate the four forces of flight: lift, drag, thrust and weight (gravity). They experiment with flight-testing various objects commonly found around the house and constructing paper...
Lesson Plan
LABScI

Catapult: Flight of the Marshmallows

For Students 6th - 12th
Watch your marshmallows fly. The engaging STEM activity has groups create a catapult to launch marshmallows. After testing their prototypes, they consider improvements and redesign their catapults.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Flight 2

For Teachers 6th - 8th
Students are introduced to two of the four principles of flight: drag and thrust. As the class watches a video on these principles, they utilize ballons, straws and clothepins to simulate what they're seeing in the show. Nice, hands-on...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

How Airplanes Fly?

For Teachers 5th
Fifth graders explore drag, thrust, lift and weight.  In this airplane lesson, 5th graders define the forces that effect airplanes and design a model airplane.  Students  compare their models for the...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What Makes Airplanes Fly?

For Teachers 7th - 9th
Students examine force and conduct activities that model parachutes and helicopters.  In this airplanes lesson students identify the forces that make airplanes fly higher and land. 
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

How Things Fly

For Teachers 8th - 12th
Students will examine the physics of flight through using experimental inquiry. In this lesson, you'll introduce your students to the four forces of flight--drag, lift, thrust, and weight--through a variety of fun-filled flight...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Apollo Moon Landing

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Students explore paper rockets, learn about the Apollo Program and Apollo spin-offs, and use simple office supplies to design and create a new useful product. This amazing plan is incredibly well written and leads students through a...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

MAKE IT FLY

For Teachers 8th - 10th
Students utilize the process of scientific inquiry and technological design to explain thrust, weight, lift and drag in flight. They design an "airplane" to test the "mechanics" of flight. In addition, they brainstorm and sketch a design...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Gliders

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Students design and build a small glider. They see how the flight of a bird is similar to the flight of a sailplane. They explain how birds get their thrust and how they control their direction of flight.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Boomerangs Keep Coming Back

For Teachers 7th - 8th
Students investigate the flight of paper boomerangs. For this flight lesson, students examine the flight variables of paper boomerangs, which they make, by investigating the concepts of lift and drag. They examine what happens when an...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Glide Away

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Students design and construct a gliding aircraft. They use the Internet as a research tool to gain background information about specific flight principles.
Worksheet
Curated OER

Simple Machines

For Students 9th - 12th
In this simple machines instructional activity, students identify the 6 simple machines. They answer 21 questions about the types of simple machines, the output force of simple machines, the input force and the work involved in using a...
Worksheet
Curated OER

What is Work?

For Students 7th - 11th
In this work worksheet, students will match vocabulary words with definitions: joule, Newton, force, and work. Then students will answer 8 problems based on the equation: work = force x distance.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What Makes Thing Fly?

For Teachers 2nd
Second graders study lift, drag and thrust from a real flight instructor.  In this physical science lesson students build and fly paper airplanes and experiment with variations and design. 
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Rockets!!

For Teachers 6th - 9th
Learners launch a rocket.  In this laws of motion lesson, students discuss the forces of flight, how a plane flies and how a rocket gets off the ground.  Learners watch a video about rocket launches, discuss Newton's Third Law...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

THE FLIGHT PLATFORM

For Teachers All
Students examine forces that effect flight.  In this flight lesson students answer questions that are asked of them and the ones that they ask themselves.