Engage young biologists in exploring the mysteries of life with this collection of hands-on activities. Enlisting the help of numerous digital resources, students get an up-close look at the structure of plant and animal...

Is DNA still present after picking fruit or cooking vegetables? Biology scholars extract and collect DNA strands in an impactful lab. Working groups prepare their samples and compare their results to negative and positive standard...

How do reverse transcriptase inhibitors work? Young virologists examine the function of azidothymidine, a drug doctors use to treat HIV patients, during a hands-on modeling activity. Groups create a strand of DNA from an HIV RNA strand...

Before a cell replicates, its DNA must replicate. Take advantage of a hands-on guided lesson plan to teach budding scientists how this happens. Using a set of nucleotide cards, learners become the DNA and work to create matching strands...

Where is a geneticist's favorite place to swim? A gene pool. Young geneticists complete hands-on activities, experiments, and real-world problem solving throughout the unit. With extra focus on dominant and recessive genes, Punnett...

A pinch of adenine, a dash of thymine and ta-da, you have life! Well, it's not quite that simple, but through this series of activities and experiments young scientists learn about the structure of DNA and how it contains the recipe...

Are women's eggs similar to chicken eggs? Scholars compare eggs from various species to better understand embryonic development. Connections to evolution through hands-on activities help to cement the new vocabulary introduced.

Dinnertime on the African savanna is a highly choreographed event! Introduce young ecologists to the concept of niche partitioning through a hands-on activity. Pupils research animal behaviors and use data to develop an understanding of...

Use food coloring in electrophoresis. The last segment in a four-part series mimics DNA fingerprinting by using chromatography. Teams conduct chromatography on food coloring to find colors that use similar pigmentation in their makeup.

What do you have in common with a fruit fly? About 60 percent of your DNA. The resource, divided into two units, is intended for grades four to eight and another for high schoolers. Both units include eight lessons covering the...

Sometimes science lab can be ... delicious! Middle school science scholars extract DNA from strawberries and other fruits in an engaging lab activity. The teacher's guide includes pacing, materials list, and worksheets with answer keys.

Um may be the atomic symbol for confusion, but it won't be needed in this lesson. Scholars rotate through seven stations completing experiments, hands-on activities, writing exercises, and analysis. Stations include material on...

For scholars tired of reading the textbook, this unit includes nine hands-on lessons. Through group work, lab activities, experiments, and even one inquiry-based lesson, scholars apply knowledge about cells, genetics, and...

How did the Ebola virus first infect humans? Young virologists examine genetic sequences from the 2014 Sierra Leone outbreak to find similarities during a riveting activity. Following similar methods used by MIT and Harvard, partners...

How exactly does a crime scene investigation work? The resource, a unit on criminology, covers everything from the deductive reasoning skills needed for detectives to DNA fingerprinting, all the way to how to gather evidence and bring...

Forensic scientists depend on their observation skills to analyze evidence down to the molecular level. Middle and high schoolers practice making observations and predictions with a series of crime scene activities, which includes a...

Think like an engineer and an agricultural scientist over the course of 12 lessons in a STEM based unit. Young scientists take on the roles of animal physiologists, animal geneticists, agricultural engineers, animal nutritionists,...

Can science scholars describe a nucleus without mentioning DNA, or a chloroplast without mentioning the color green? Test their organelle understanding through an exciting card game. Groups take turns guessing the correct organelle or...

Find out the science behind ancestry testing! Investigators watch a video exploring how ancestry works before participating in a hands-on group activity. Scholars role play scientists while learning about testing protocols and test...

An exciting activity has scholars use cell parts to build bacteria through cooperation with other groups. Each group has some of the cell parts needed, but they must trade with other groups to be able to fulfill their function as a...

Different types of mutations cause unique types and degrees of muscular dystrophy. Scholars learn about the types of mutations and the impact on the body. They compare the location of the mutations and draw conclusions about how it is...