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Determining the Age of Fossils
Students examine the concept of radioactive dating. In this radioactive dating lesson, students investigate how to determine the ages of fossils and rocks as they learn about half-life radioactive decay.
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Open-Ended Scientific Method Lab
Students inspect a given problem and come up with a hypothesis. In this investigative lesson students come up with a hypothesis for a problem, test each hypothesis and evaluate how successful each one was.
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CAN'T TOUCH THIS!
Students discover the best practical shielding material when dealing with radioactive substances. They draw conclusions based on availability of materials, price, and best shielding properties.
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Bounce Back Ball
Fifth graders work in teams of four to measure the rebound heights of a tennis ball dropped from four different heights. They investigate with the bouncing balls to measure changes in the type of energy they possess.
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Temperature School
Students observ the cooling and warming of room temperature, hot, and ice cold cans of water by measuring the change in temperature over time. They then attempt to develop explanations for the observations made and apply their findings...
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And the Survey Says...
Eighth graders evaluate whether a certain argument is valid or invalid. For this science lesson, 8th graders discuss the importance of using unbiased evidence. They design an experiment that they can test in school.
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Careers in Science
Students learn the trends in the current job market for scientists,
find where the jobs are, the range of salaries, and the job requirements.
They discover that scientists do some very interesting things, then
write a letter of...
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Plot! Analyze! Draw your Conclusions!
Learners download data reported from the Global Sun Temperature Project website. They graph and analyze the data looking for trends and patterns. They prepare a class report with their observations and post it to the website.
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Insect Monitoring
Learners participate in an interactive lesson using the scientific method to study biodiversity. In this insect monitoring lesson, students simulate the layers of soil and the insects that would live there. Learners design...
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Measuring the Speed of a Wave
Pupils create an experiment in which they measure the speed of a wave and record the data in a graph. They work in small groups to write the procedure for the experiment and share it with another group for cross checking of the activity....
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US Historical Climate: Excel Statistical
Young scholars import US Historical Climate Network mean temperature data into Excel from a station of their choice. They are guided through the activity on how to use Excel for statistical calculations, graphing, and linear trend...
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The Big Bang Theory
Students will use scientific reasoning to formulate ideas about the formation of the universe using the Big Bang Theory. The use of critical thinking skills is part of the activity and the foundation of the scientific method will serve...
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Stream Chemistry Monitoring
Learners become familiar with real-world gathering of chemical data. The experience how the science is done: the nature of analysis, data collection, interpretation, and presentation. They study a nearby body of water for their experiment.
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Do the Elephants Need Sunscreen? A Study of the Weather Patterns in Etosha
Learners analyze the weather patterns in Namibia. They create a graph of the yearly temperatures and use the internet to gather information. They discuss how the weather goes in cycles in the area.
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The Universe
Students describe what scientists mean by an "expanding universe" in their own words. They explain how scientists comprehend the universie is expanding. Students comprehend the vast scale of the universe. They comprehend how theory...
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Stellar Observations
Ninth graders study the uses of spectroscopy and the operation of the Hubble space telescope. In this astronomy lesson students complete a lab activity that includes graphing star color and temperature.
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Fishkill
High schoolers analyze data to determine the effect of thermal pollution on a certain species of fish. They graph temperature and dissolved oxygen and make inferences on the impact a change in temperature could have on the fish. As a...
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Discovering a Law of Space Physics
Students use data collected by an astronomer to determine the relationship between the time it takes the planet to orbit the sun and the average radius of the planet's orbit around the sun. Students use trial and error to find the...
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Sea Surface Temperature Trends of the Gulf Stream
Students use authentic satellite data to produce plots and graphs of sea surface temperature as they explore the seasonal changes of the Gulf Stream.
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Sea Surface Temperature Trends of the Gulf Stream
Students explore the importance of the Gulf Stream. Using a NASA satellite images, they examine the sea surface temperature. Students collect the temperature at various locations and times. Using spreadsheet technology, they graph the...
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Coral Bleaching in the Caribbean
Students use authentic satellite data on the NASA website to determine when the sea surface temperature meets the criteria to induce coral bleaching.
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Sea Floor Spreading II
Students import ocean bathymetry data from text files. They then graph these observations along with model predictions to assess the model's ability to simulate observed topographic features of the North Atlantic. Students use Excel to...
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You Gotta Have Heart
Ninth graders investigate the concept of relations and interpret graphs and tables. They analyze given data and look for a pattern to determine if the numbers represent a function. Students practice solving scientific word problems that...
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Plants Under Attack
Third graders will identify the four needs for plant survival and gain skills and confidence in using scientific measurement tools, probes as well as the spreadsheets and graphing capacity of a computer to represent and analyze data.They...