Virginia Department of Education
Heat Loss from a Fur-Insulated Animal
How do animals adapt to weather changes? Provide your class with the ability to understand adaptations and body temperature as they participate in this hands on experiment, using fake fur and hot water. Pupils collect data and analyze...
Curated OER
Preserving the Memory
Young historians explore ways to help preserve historic battlefields and artifacts. Designed for secondary scholars, the resource focuses on Civil War battlefields and the National Registrar of Historic Places Application. Pupils also...
Minneapolis Community Education
Everyday Leaders Guide
Leadership skills are a key component of service-learning. A 31-page booklet provides facilitators and participating partners with an explanation of service-learning, information about the principles and practices of responsive...
Overcoming Obstacles
Finding Solutions
Middle schoolers apply all they have learned in the Problem Solving module by participating in a contest to see which group can build the tallest tower using only sheets of paper and masking tape.
Polar Trec
Arctic Smorgasbord!
Two blooms of phytoplankton, instead of just one, now occur in the Arctic due to declining sea ice, which will have widespread effects on the marine life and climate. In small groups, participants build an Arctic food web with given...
University of Connecticut
Weather Vs. Whether
Monarch butterfly populations have decreased by 90 percent over the past 20 years due to misuse and ineffectiveness of some pesticides. Given the challenge to increase pesticide safety and effectiveness, the class, through discussion,...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Revolution '67, Lesson 2: What Happened in July 1967? How Do We Know?
Even in a world in which dozens of participants and curious onlookers record every controversial event, the basic facts of what happened are often in dispute. Revolution '67, Lesson 2 explores 1967 Newark, New Jersey using an examination...
John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum
Red States/Blue States: Mapping the Presidential Election
Young historians investigate how voting patterns have changed by comparing the outcome of the 1960 election to the outcome of the recent election. A creative final assessment has participants making a news show wherein they provide...
CK-12 Foundation
Values Written as Powers: Binary Numbers 1 to 8
A six-question interactive tasks scholars with adding binary numbers one through eight. A tool acts as a visual aid to showcase the patterns made when working with base—2, digits zero and one. Question types include fill in the blank,...
Nemours KidsHealth
Cyberbulling: Grades 6-8
Cyberbullying is the focus of two lessons. First, scholars discuss what cyberbullying is, and examine a problem-solving approach to handling cyberbullying, then create brochures on the topic. Second, pupils discuss the effects...
K20 LEARN
Bear Tale: Author's Purpose - Informing Or Entertaining
After reading The Mitten by Jan Brett, scholars discuss the author's purpose. Small groups compare and contrast a book written to entertain and a book to inform, then create a T-Chart detailing the characteristics of each. Learners...
It's About Time
Natural Selection
Are you the predator or the prey? Student groups participate in an activity to demonstrate the process of natural selection in a contained environment. After scholars complete the activity and questions, they apply their knowledge to a...
DocsTeach
The New Deal: Revolution or Reform?
Scholars weigh in on FDR's New Deal policies in an in-depth activity. The resource uses historical documents to explore whether the New Deal polices were reformatory or revolutionary. Learners review documents, rate them using a scale,...
American Chemical Society
Why Do Puddles Dry Up?
Bring evaporation right into the hands of young scientists with an entertaining, hands-on activity. Investigators view videos and images while participating in class dialogue focused on water evaporating from surfaces. A short experiment...
PBS
Categorizing Matter | UNC-TV Science
Take the difficulty out of classifying matter with an easy-to-follow activity that makes distinguishing between pure substances and mixtures simple. Scholars explore how matter is grouped between two categories—pure substances and...
Overcoming Obstacles
Making and Evaluating Decisions
It's time to decide. Class members review the decision-making process (define the issue, gather information, develop alternative, and analyze the consequences). Groups then decide which of the six characters they have chosen for the...
EngageNY
Choosing a Book That Interests Me: Seeking the Superhero Reader in Me
Selecting a "power book" and engaging in a structured class discussion are the learning targets for this fourth lesson in a larger unit. It is designed as a beginning of the year unit for establishing norms and routines in the classroom....
EngageNY
Science Talk: How do Bullfrogs Survive
Following the reading of the book Bullfrog at Magnolia Circle, the ninth instructional activity in this unit involves emerging experts in a science talk about how bullfrogs survive. Looking back through the text, young scholars prepare...
Curated OER
Groups We Belong To
Students explore society by completing a class identification activity. For this student identification lesson, students participate in a classification activity in which students with a certain hair, eye or clothing color are divided...
Curated OER
Risk Communication: Media Presentation Exercise
Students work in groups to prepare a brief broadcast or print news report from one of five possible viewpoints about an environmental contamination scenario. Students are given basic information about a chemical spill in a small town and...
Curated OER
The Box
Learners of any age can participate in this imagination and improve development activity. With the use of a small box, they work through a series of questions or situations posed by the teacher. Each group uses the box to create short...
Curated OER
Communication and Social Networks
Pupils work in cooperative groups to explore communication needs of our world. They are assigned a demographic area and asked to create ways to solve communication problems with innovative ideas. They also explore areas that can help...
Curated OER
On 'Punched Out': Looking at Brain Trauma and Other Risks of Violent Sports
The tragic story of Derek Boogard, a hockey star whose sports-related brain injuries eventually lead to his death, is told through a series of videos. There are also articles that can be read. This poignant lesson gets participants to...
Curated OER
Welcome to My World
Elementary schoolers discuss what a community is, and what their community has to offer them. They create posters, or flyers for the different businesses or places in their community to place around their school. After the students have...