Illustrative Mathematics
The Marble Jar
A jar is filled with 1,500 marbles and customers of a bank can enter a contest to guess the correct percentage of blue marbles. How can an employee at the bank estimate the actual percentage without physically counting all 1,500 marbles?...
Curated OER
Flowing From Here to There
Sixth graders discover how humans modify their environment. They work together to design their own simple machine to transport materials. They record observations and suggest modifications.
Curated OER
Community Construction
Students are assigned the task of building a community building. They construct the building using a computer graphics design program. The simulated building when completed be put together to form a small town.
Curated OER
Symmetrical Masks
Fifth graders examine symmetrical and asymmetrical balance while making a mask using a variety of colored pencil and marker techniques. They use the process of revision and design as they complete their masks.
Curated OER
I am Special and You are Special Too - Project Children L.E.A.D.
Eighth graders recognize what makes them special through class participation and discussion of rap music, writing a poem about themselves, and designing their own special hat while working in groups.
Curated OER
Fabric Collage
Students practice simple hand sewing techniques to repair clothing using various stitches and techniques for sewing a button to fabric. They design and create a fabric collage that includes at least one button, two types of hand...
Curated OER
Using the Internet to Challenge Young Writers
Designed as a professional development exercise to introduce teachers to the Internet, the activities in this resource ask novice web surfers to access a series of sites, bookmark them, and answer question about information found on the...
Curated OER
Using Bean Bags
Here is useful lesson plan which demonstrates how bean bags can be used to develop manipulative skills. Young learners gain awareness of their bodies by taking part in this exercise. They also respond to a whistle, and focus on following...
Austin Independent School District
Social Studies Strategies: Concept of a Definition Map
Model for your class members how to use a definition map to make connections between new words and prior knowledge. Although the strategy is designed for social studies classes, the approach can be use at any grade level and in any...
Curated OER
The 13 Days of Halloween
Students practice counting from one to thirteen. They create a Halloween counting webpage.
Curated OER
Designed to Scale
Seventh graders construct a three dimensional model of a constellation. In this constellation lesson, 7th graders make a blueprint for a scale model of the constellation and create their models. They present their models to the class.
Curated OER
Designed to Scale
Seventh graders study ratios, scale and distances according to a three dimensional model. In this exploratory instructional activity students create their own constellation and prepare an oral presentation that describes their model.
LABScI
Catapult: Flight of the Marshmallows
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.
DiscoverE
Action Figure Diver
Will your next buoyancy lab rise to the occasion? Make a splash with action figure divers! Teams of young physicists explore the relationship between mass and buoyancy by adding weights or balloons to achieve a diver that neither sinks...
Curated OER
Lyddie: An Instructional Unit Resource Guide
Katherine Paterson’s young adult novel Lyddie is the foundation of a differentiated instruction unit that not only explores the rise of industrialization and labor but women’s rights issues as well. After learners read the novel, they...
MENSA Education & Research Foundation
Utopia/Dystopia: The American Dream
America was founded by dreamers, and the American dream still resonates in our country today. Track the American dream from its Puritan beginnings to its optimistic descendants with a instructional activity that focuses on speeches by...
Special Olympics
A World of Difference
Kids engage in a series of activities that ask them to consider differences and similarities in characteristics, both visible and invisible. With this new understanding, the class investigates the Special Olympics program and develops...
Special Olympics
SO…What’s the Challenge?
Whose responsibility is it to protect equal rights? Class members engage in a series of activities that create awareness of the prejudice and intolerance persons with disabilities face. They then create a message addressed to their...
Curated OER
Roll with the Punches: Depression Era Machinery
Learners construct models of simple and complicated machines with Legos. Then they design an experiment using the scientific method. ESE modifications included.
Curated OER
TE Lesson: How Clean is that Water?
Students examine the factors the affect water quality, and allow for animals and plants to live. They look at how engineers apply water quality information when making stream modifications in order to ensure drinking water quality. They...
Curated OER
I Believe
This lesson is designed to teach students the definition of persuasive writing, and to have them use the elements of persuasive writing to complete a writing assignment. The Web site will be used to introduce persuasive writing and the...
Curated OER
What Does That Flag Mean?
Students describe how symbolism is used in flags as they research the symbolism in country flags and create a new flag design. They begin investigating the meaning behind the Olympic flag and then continue with the flags of South Africa...
Curated OER
Biotechnology, GMOs and Food
Twelfth graders explore controversy around genetically modified foods, identify source of controversy, and role play town hall meeting on genetically modified foods, to examine viewpoints and arguments for and against genetic modification.
Curated OER
Up, Up and Away
Fourth graders design and launch rockets. In this rocket lesson plan, 4th graders observe the changes in outcome caused by size and fuel variables. Students navigate the NASA website to learn the parts of a rocket. Students load the...