Texas Education Agency (TEA)
Build a Paper Structure
Who knew that paper is an amazing building material? Scholars learn about the properties of planar materials, such as paper, as well as their structural capabilities in the sixth instructional activity a series of 11 on architecture....
Teach Engineering
Bone Density Challenge Introduction
Can you use X-rays to measure bone mineral density? This is the essential question that learners must answer in the first installment of a seven-part series. They brainstorm ideas about necessary background information and what they...
Teach Engineering
Service-Based Engineering Design Project
Do some good for the community while learning about engineering. Groups complete a service-based engineering design project over the course of five weeks. The resource provides guidance on how to conduct the project and help pupils get...
Discovery Education
It's Too Loud!
STEM scholars investigate sound attenuation by conducting an experiment in which they compare the farthest distance that they can hear a sound with and without ear protection.
TryEngineering
Choose Your Best Way
Find the best path through town. The lesson teaches future computer programmers about networks and paths in graph theory. They develop a network of their towns to determine the most efficient path to visit each of their homes.
TryEngineering
Give Binary a Try!
Digital, analog, and now binary clocks? The lesson teaches individuals how to interpret binary code. They use an online software program to read binary clocks.
TryEngineering
Solving Problems with Decision Trees
Combat crime with computers. The activity teaches young computer scientists about decision trees and how to use them. They consider telecommunications subscriptions and how decision trees can help detect fraud.
TryEngineering
Search Engines
Learn how to find things quickly and efficiently on the Internet. The lesson plan teaches how search engines work and how to efficiently use them. It includes an activity where groups develop search queries to find sites using given...
TryEngineering
Circuits and Boolean Expressions
Teach basic logic using Boolean operators. Young computer scientists learn about the operators NOT, AND, and OR, and how they can be expressed using Boolean notation, logic gates, or truth tables. Along the way, they learn about half...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Waterproof that Roof!
Learners design and build model houses, with an emphasis on waterproof roofs. They perform tests to see if their models are as waterproof as they think.
Teach Engineering
See the Genes
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough" - Albert Einstein. The sixth installment of a seven-part series teaches young scientists about the importance of being able to communicate scientific research and...
Teach Engineering
Quantifying Refraction
Class members discover how mathematics can quantify the behavior of light waves with the fourth installment of a seven-part series that teaches future engineers about equations related to refraction, including the equation to calculate...
Teach Engineering
Wimpy Radar Antenna
The Diary of a Wimpy Antenna? In the last installment of a six-part series, your class constructs a model of a radio antenna and tests its torque. Pupils use the results to design a better model that resists bending and twisting forces.
Teach Engineering
Investigating Torque
Torque--a teachable moment? Here's a instructional activity on torque (or moment) and variables that include size, reinforcement, structural bracing, and material that affect torque.
Teach Engineering
Exploring the Forces of Tension
Let the resource stretch the minds of your young scientists with a lesson about tensile strength and stiffness of materials. Groups consider how easily materials stretch and relate this property to engineering design.
Teach Engineering
Fairly Fundamental Facts About Forces and Structures
Don't twist and turn looking for a resource. The first installment of a six-part series teaches young engineers about the five fundamental forces of compression, tension, shear, bending, and torsion. These forces help explain different...
Teach Engineering
How a Hybrid Works
Work with your class to connect series and parallel circuits to hybrid cars. The lesson introduces basic circuit diagrams before having scholars apply the understanding of the difference between parallel and series circuits to hybrid cars.
Teach Engineering
Complex Networks and Graphs
Show your class how engineers use graphs to understand large and complex systems. The resource provides the beginnings of graph theory by introducing the class to set theory, graphs, and degree distributions of a graph.
Teach Engineering
Electromagnets
Show your class what goes on with a magnet that can be turned on and off with a resource that provides the information needed to build an electromagnet. The information allows the class to understand that creating loops with the current...
Teach Engineering
Magnetic Fields
Introduce your class to magnetic fields with an activity that demonstrates that a compass is affected by the magnetic field of the earth, unless a closer, stronger magnetic field is present. Pupils can use this fact in the associated...
Teach Engineering
Magnetic Materials
The design challenge: develop a method to separate steel from aluminum. The first lesson plan in an eight-part series introduces the class to the grand challenge of ciming up with a method to streamline a sorting process at a recycling...
Teach Engineering
Rube Goldberg and the Meaning of Machines
A Rube Goldberg machine does not really look like it would make work easier. Introduce your class to Rube Goldberg with a resource that shows how his inventions make simple tasks harder to complete.
Teach Engineering
Not So Simple
Compound machines, nothing more than a combination of simple machines working together, are the focus of an activity that asks class members to use the provided information to take a look at the way innovators combine simple machines to...
Teach Engineering
Levers that Lift
Introduce your class to to the remaining three simple machines-- the lever, pulley, and the wheel-and-axle with a plan that includes the three different types of levers in the discussion of levers. The lesson plan continues with the...