How many pennies can an aluminum foil boat hold? That is the challenge in a collaborative activity designed to explore the concept of buoyancy. Learners use aluminum foil to build makeshift boats and test the weight they hold before...

Clay itself sinks, but clay boats float. Why? Young engineers build clay boats to learn about buoyancy. They test the weight the boats can hold using washers and then tweak their designs to make improvements, following the engineering...

Create a cushion of carbon dioxide gas to float some soap bubbles on. Many concepts can be demonstrated through this activity: Carbon dioxide gas is more dense than air Bubbles are semipermeable, allowing only carbon dioxide to diffuse...

Water with varying amounts of dissolved salt are dyed and then used to compare densities. The objective is to discover the effect of salinity, and therefore density, on ocean water on the stability of the ocean. Many branches of science...

Explore the concept of density within states of matter—gases, liquids, and solids—through a group experiment in which young scientists test objects' texture, color, weight, size, and ability to sink or float.    

This particular lesson was written by the National Earth Science Teachers Association, but density is a concept that you can teach at the beginning of the school year in your life, physical, or earth science classes. It would be fun to...

Flotsam by David Wiesner and The Magic School Bus on the Ocean Floor by Joanna Cole, illustrated by Bruce Degen, begin a reading adventure pack focusing on oceans. With story listening and thoughtful discussion, scholars complete several...

Students explore the concept of buoyancy through experimentation. Given materials of various weights and composition, they drop them in club soda and determine which substances sink or float. Students discuss their results in terms of...

Students investigate buoyancy by participating in a lab experiment. In this density lesson plan, students utilize vinegar and alcohol in beakers and attempt to float different items in them. Students analyze which items float and do not...

Students investigate Archimedes' Principle and show how it relates to density. In this Archimedes' Principle lesson plan, students experiment with a beaker of water, a Styrofoam "boat" and a weight. They predict what will happen when the...

Students watch the teacher do a demonstration of density with diet and regular soda. Note: try this first, as different types of artificial sweetener have different densities. Students discuss density and volume. They discuss "Relational...

Sixth graders develop an understanding of floating, sinking, density, and buoyancy and apply it to the design of testing of ships.

Now is the time to educate tomorrow's citizens to care for the planet, and here is a lesson to help facilitate the process. Collect some marine debris and bring it into class. Have your class separate it into types and then test each...

Fourth graders, in groups, experiment with density and the displacement of water by creating and designing their own boats and seeing which boat holds the most centimeter cubes without sinking..

Middle schoolers participate in an experiment to determine if a toy boat will sink or float. They make the boats out of different materials and determine its carrying capacity by adding pennies. They graph their findings on a classroom...

Students discover the Archimedes principle through a buoyancy experiment. They measure the water displacement of a lump a clay which is denser than water then reshape the clay into a bowl which floats but displaces more water.

Students participate in an experiment about the weight of water. They work together to discover that seawater is more dense than fresh water. They also determine which objects float and sink.

Learners construct their own submarine following a certain procedure. In this physics lesson, students calculate the density of objects using a mathematical formula. They explain why some object floats in water while some do not.

How does a scuba diver control whether they sink or float? Scholars observe the relationship between absolute pressure and depth below the surface in an undersea simulation. They control the diver size and depth to center of mass to...

First graders listen to the book "Mr. Betts and Mr. Potts" and examine the career of being a veterinarian. They categorize animals based on whether they could be house pets or not, develop a class pet graph, and list the various...

Students examine whether objects will sink or float.  In this buoyancy lesson plan students bring in objects and experiment to see if they sink or float.

Students build a miniature replica of the Mayflower. They make the boat float in a cup of water while studying the concept of gift giving on Feast Day.

Learners investigate prime and composite numbers. They use a number chart and cross out multiples of 2,3,5 etc. up to 100. Pupils fold pieces of masking tape around pennies and label them with composite numbers, then fold masking tape...

Some microbes are beneficial for humans. This resource asks learners to identify beverages that contain healthy microbes. There are six beverages shown, and pupils must place a check mark next to the ones they think contain healthy...