Curated OER
The Gravity Of It All-Newton's Laws
Learners experiment with the concept of Newton's second law of motion. After building a ramp, they determine whether a large marble or a small marble will move farther, based on Newton's law. Students record their data on the provided....
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Playground Modeling K-2
Students use and develop their spatial-visualization skills to represent features and physical objects on their playground. Working in groups, they use everyday classroom materials (blocks, crayons, counters, etc.) to build a simple...
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Challenger's Lost Lessons - The Lost Simple Machines Lesson
Students investigate the characteristics of simple machines. In this simple machine lesson, students investigate work as a product of applying constant force. They answer questions about what happens on Earth and what may have happened...
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For Creative Minds
Students study pictures of plants, animals, and minerals. Students classify the pictures into the three groups. In this rock identification instructional activity, students complete a rock finding lab experiment by finding, cleaning,...
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The Global Precipitation Measurement Mission (GPM) Lesson
Introduce your class to one of the ways that technology is benefiting humanity. The Global Precipitation Measurement Mission involves the data collected by nine satellites from different countries with a united focus on studying world...
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Types And Magnitudes Of Earthquakes
Students investigate the concept of earthquakes and the different types of magnitudes. They research the Richter scale and how it is used to measure the intensities of earthquakes. Students then apply the concept by completing a...
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Earthquakes
Fifth graders explore the causes of earthquakes and the various types of fault lines through a variety of hands-on demonstrations using prepared cakes. They record their observations in their science journals.
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Is It Living?
Students investigate the definition of life and alive in the context of a unit that is involved with building their own planet. They participate in a class discussion about defining life, and in small groups analyze artifacts to...
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Construct with Solids
Students discover which properties of solids lend themselves to building a tower through hands on trial and error and observation of others as they are building. They write down the steps it took them to build the tower and label an...
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Weathering Rocks
Here is a geology lesson plan that is sure to get your charges excited. It's all about the process of weathering of rocks. Learners study natural events that can cause rocks to break apart. Some of these events are: ice wedging, plant...
Science Matters
Wattsville and Mercalli Booklet
There has been an earthquake! Can you listen to the description of damage given by callers in order to determine the epicenter? The 11th of 20 lessons has pupils read a script of one emergency caller. The class records the information on...
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Wind Power
What a wonderful way to explore wind power! Through this lesson plan, learners get a background in the history of wind power, create their own wind turbine, and the test their designs. This is a terrific way to tie scientific principles...
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The Magnetic Sun
Learners follow steps to build a simple version of a magnetometer, an instrument capable of detecting areas of strong magnetic field. Students use the magnetometer to investigate models of the Sun and examine images of the Sun.
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Bridges
Ninth graders use model-building to help comprehend the forces and phenomena at work in the world around them. They describe gravity as a universal force that pulls everything toward the center of the earth. Students distinguish between...
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Lunar Life Support
High schoolers design and build models of nine life support systems which are crucial to our successful settlement of the Moon. Each team must define the requirements of their system, exploring how these requirements are currently being...
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Acid Rain: The Disappearing Statue
Second graders examine the effects of acid rain on statues and buildings. They participate in an experiment in which they use different chemicals on building materials. They observe and record their observations.
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Flood Control Project
Students examine the reasons why dams were built in Nebraska. They identify factors that need to be considered when building a dam. They create a dam of their own.
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Sedimentary Structures- An Adventure in Painting and Collage
Young scholars identify and interpret concepts about how the Earth was formed and convey some of these ideas in a painting.
Students experiment with different types of paints and paint applicators to achieve a variety of visual...
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Atoms, Kinetic Theory, Solids and Fluids
Students identify and describe the building blocks that make up an atom. They also compare the ages of atoms to the ages of the materials they compose,as well as, give examples that illustrate the small size of atoms.
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Landscape Picture Map: Natural and People Made Features
Students explore the places and objects that make up the Earth's surface. In this natural and people made features lesson, students identify things they've seen that are people made and those that are natural to the environment. ...
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Groundwater Modeling
Students evaluate the effects of point and non-pointy sources of water pollution using a model. They assess human impact on water quality. Students build a model which represents an aspect of the hydrosphere and compare their model with...
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Laws of the Jungle
Middle schoolers build a video game on predator-prey relationship. In this biology lesson, students identify the variables that affect this relationship. They write a short description and play each other's game.
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Planet Research
Young scholars recognize that the other eight known planets, which revolve around the Sun, have characteristics and surface conditions that are different from Earth; and identify examples of those differences.
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Cloud Shadows
Young scholars classify the visual opacity of various materials, what is needed to create shadows, and classify clouds by the types of shadows that they produce.