Lesson Planet Curated
Sustainable Design and Biomimicry in a Desert Ecosystem
Challenge young engineers to design a sustainable guest village in Arizona’s Saguaro National Park. A collection of four lessons and five activities provide designers with all the information they need to complete the challenge of living...
Lesson Planet Curated
Surface Tension
Adhesion and cohesion, capillary motion and wetting states, hydrophilic and hydrophobic surfaces are the focus of a nine-resource collection that has high schoolers examine some of the interesting properties of water. The four lessons...
Lesson Planet Curated
Weather and Atmosphere
Weather engineers have come a long way in designing technology that provides advanced warnings of severe weather. Six lessons and six activities make up a collection of resources that teach middle schoolers about weather and weather...
Lesson Planet Curated
Simple Machines
A collection of five lessons and activities introduce young engineers to simple and compound machines. Groups use the engineering design process to design a Rube Goldberg machine to move a circus elephant into a rail car, a pulley system...
Lesson Planet Curated
Mixtures and Solutions
Engineers must consider the properties of matter when designing new things like synthetic materials, medicines, cleaning solutions, devices, and structures. To prepare for this new world, brave young engineers examine the fundamentals of...
Lesson Planet Curated
Mission to Mars
Martians beware! Earthlings are on the way! A 13-resource collection prepares future astronauts for space travel by studying interesting facts about the Red Planet, the history of Martian exploration, and the development of robotics....
Lesson Planet Curated
Adventure Engineering Challenge: Asteroid Impact
Oh, no! An asteroid is on a collision course with Earth!. The challenge, should your students choose to accept it, is to design underground survival caverns to shelter people for one year. Over the course of eight lessons, engineering...
Lesson Planet Curated
Life Science
Photosynthesis, extinction, biomimicry, and bioremediation. Young environmental engineers study these processes. Using photosynthesis as a model and biomimicry as an example, groups research how nature provides hints for engineering...
Lesson Planet Curated
Up, Up and Away! - Airplanes
Oh, if only Sir Isaac and Bernoulli could see us now. Even Orville and Wilbur would be amazed by what engineers have designed using their ideas. Next generation engineers put these principles to use as they use what they learn about...
Lesson Planet Curated
Standing Up for Democracy
The mission of the Standing Up for Democracy unit is to bring about “a more humane, just, and compassionate society rooted in democratic values.” These 16 lessons, built on a foundation of mutual respect, tolerance, and participation,...
Lesson Planet Curated
Environmental Engineering and Water Chemistry
Introduce young scientists to the fundamentals of environmental engineering with a nine-resource collection that looks at air, land, and water quality concerns. The unit begins with a PowerPoint presentation that provides background...
Lesson Planet Curated
Making Finance Personal: Project-Based Learning for the Personal Finance Classroom
Cash in on a unit of lessons that use a project-based learning approach to teach high schoolers how to manage their personal finances. The 11 lessons include detailed instructions, as well as printable forms, and rubrics for the project...
Lesson Planet Curated
Earth's Spheres and Natural Resources
The geosphere, exosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere are Earth's four main spheres. Surprisingly, all of these spheres work together providing us with resources, weather, plants, climate, and a place to live. Here is a collection of...
Lesson Planet Curated
Life Science: Ecosystems and the Flow of Energy
Different ecosystems thrive in various places, with a variety of habitats, including specific plants and animals that have adapted to survive in those specific conditions. But they all have one thing in common: all of the energy that...
Lesson Planet Curated
Before and Beyond the Constitution: What Should a President Do?
A three-lesson unit provides middle schoolers with the founding fathers' vision of what they saw as the role of the president and the executive branch of the government. Young scholars examine the Articles of Confederation, Alexander...
Lesson Planet Curated
WE Are Innovators: High School Resources
The five lessons in a collection from WE are Innovators encourages high schoolers to go where scientists have not gone before. They read articles and watch videos to gather information and then use an innovative mindset and their problem...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 7-9, Unit 4
Climate change affects people and countries around the world in different ways. Through a five-lesson unit, students learn about the many types of impacts. They engage in role-playing games, reflect on how their actions contribute to...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 7-9, Unit 3
Living things and ecosystems respond to and are affected by climate change. In this collection of four lessons, students learn about how researchers—now and in the past—have used plant lifecycle events to understand climate. Pupils...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 7-9, Unit 2
A pre-test launches a unit study of whether the weather is changing. After reviewing the differences between weather and climate, scholars examine historical climate data and then compare regional weather changes with overall global...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 7-9, Unit 1
Engage young scientists in a study of climate change with a collections of lessons that combine online research with labs, videos, activities, nature walks, and a NASA data analysis tool to examine different Earth's systems and how they...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 10-12, Unit 4
Climate change is the focus of a three-lesson collection that asks students to consider how people living around the world are affected by the changes they researched. In the second lesson they examine their own carbon footprints.The...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 10-12, Unit 3
A four-lesson collection has scholars collecting data to determine how climate affects phenology. The unit begins with class embers collecting life-cycle data on their campus. They then collect, graph, and analyze data on trees to show...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 10-12, Unit 2
A five-lesson collection examines how current climate changes are different from those in the past. Young scientists gather data from sources life fossils, tree rings, ice cores, and global CO2 levels to determine similarities and...
Lesson Planet Curated
Climate Change in My Backyard: Grades 10-12, Unit 1
A four-lesson collection asks high schoolers to consider their role in climate change. They study the carbon cycle, the role of greenhouse gases, factors that effect the rates of photosynthesis and respiration, and the services...