Berkshire Museum
Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle: Sorting Through Personal Choices
Raise children's awareness about the importance of conservation with this hands-on science lesson. Start by breaking the class into groups and having them collect trash from around the school or local park. Students then use the provided...
Creative Learning Exchange
Lesson Plans From The Lorax
When it comes to the environment, no variable is constant. Class members graph behavior over time for the thneeds produced over truffula trees chopped down over the course of Dr. Seuss's The Lorax.
McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center
Global Warming in a Jar
This well-organized lab activity introduces earth science pupils to the greenhouse effect. They will set up two experiments to monitor temperatures in an open jar, a closed jar, and a closed jar containing water. Ideally, you would have...
Curated OER
The Living Environment
Young scholars use a spoon, clothespin, scissors, and toothpicks to simulate how animals get food in their environment. For this environment lesson plan, students learn about the adaptations animals make in order to survive.
Curated OER
Science Questions
Explore the concept of generating questions. Your curious learners choose a scientific question from a bowl and, as they listen to an article being read, they use that question starter to come up with their own questions. Then, they have...
Curated OER
Cycles and Starting Mealworms
Here is a fascinating lesson about the life cycles of plants and animals, and other cycles found in nature. Learners explore the cycle of the moon, the tides, and other sequences of events in every day life. The big activity is the...
SeaWorld
Marvelous Manatees
Here is an interesting activity on the manatee for your upper graders or middle schoolers. A game is played where learners work together to complete a successful manatee migration. It's a board game, and all of the game components are...
National Gardening Association
Migration Mishaps
Elementary ecologists pretend to be migratory hummingbirds. They fly between wintering and nesting grounds, trying to reach a habitat haven. In a musical-chair fashion, some birds will miss out, and are removed from the game. To further...
Prince William Network
Migration Headache
During this game, kids become migratory shorebirds and fly among wintering, nesting, and stopover habitats. If they do not arrive at a suitable habitat on time, they do not survive. Catastrophic events are periodically introduced that...
Curated OER
Fish Communities in the Hudson
Learning to read data tables is an important skill. Use this resource for your third, fourth, or fifth graders. Learners will will study tables of fish collection data to draw conclusions. The data is based on fish environments in the...
Curated OER
Environment: Water & Air
The introduction to the lesson mentions a sailor's limited capacity to store drinking water on his ship. Pupils then set up an overnight experiment to remove freshwater from salt water by distillation. There is a math and map activity to...
Curated OER
A Science Experiment With Crayfish
A crayfish can lead to a science experiment involving habitats, animal behavior, and anatomy..
Curated OER
Tracking the Salt Front
Using the Hudson River as the focus, learners discuss the difference between salt water and fresh water environments, analyze maps and graphs, and complete addition and subtraction problems. This instructional activity comes with a...
Curated OER
How Does Your Blue Bonnet Grow?
Students explore the conditions needed to grow Texas Blue Bonnets. In this Blue Bonnet planting lesson, students recognize the differences in Texas Blue Bonnet. Students record their findings in a graphs and analyze their results.
Curated OER
A Research Project and Article For the Natural Inquirer
Get your class to use the scientific process to solve a scientific problem. They utilize the Natural Inquirer magazine to identify a research question which they write an introduction to and collect data to answer. They use graphs,...
Curated OER
Little Auk Survival Challenge
A bird's life is one of danger and intrigue as it struggles for survival in sometimes harsh environments. To understand how difficult surviving in the wild can be, children play a simulation game where they act as little auks, birds from...
Curated OER
Endangered Animals
Students listen to a teacher led lecture on jaguars, their habitats, and how they became endangered. Using a specified web site, they choose an endangered animal to research. After gathering information, students participate in...
Curated OER
Our Desert Backyard
Young scholars make observations of their own backyard. In this environment lesson, students keep records of the plants and animals they see in their home or school yard. Young scholars make notes of how the weather and environment...
Curated OER
Types of Marine Debris
Students conduct an experiment. In this marine debris and environment protection activity, students categorize trash into piles, predict whether these trash items will sink, float or be picked up and carried by the wind and then test...
Curated OER
The Life Cycle of the Mealworm
Fourth graders provide a habitat for live mealworms and observe their life cycle. In this animal life cycle and scientific inquiry lesson, 4th graders create a habitat for a live mealworm and observe and record related data as it grows....
Curated OER
Charting the Changes in Our School Forest
Fourth graders investigate the ecosystem and how forests are disappearing. In this environmental protection lesson, 4th graders analyze the changes in their school for 2 weeks. Students practice identifying trees, birds, and foliage...
Curated OER
Polluting the Environment
Fourth graders construct mini-ecosystem, pollute the ecosystem, observe, collect, and record data on the effects of these pollutants on their ecosystem, organize data on spreadsheets, create graphs, and design presentations to share with...
Curated OER
Get a Leg Up
Traveling through space is an amazing experience, but it definitely takes a toll on the body. After reading an article and watching a brief video, learners perform an experiment that simulates the effects of zero gravity on the human body.
Curated OER
Environment: Battling for Oxygen
Young scholars construct an interactive ozone depletion model using gumdrops and toothpicks. After analyzing the data obtained from the model, they record it on butcher paper and complete worksheets about oxygen.