Curated OER
Energy and the Environment: What Can We Do?
Students consider the impacts of global warming and brainstorm ways to help decrease their contribution to the problem. In this climate change lesson, students are exposed to facts concerning global warming and think of ways to...
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Trouble in the Troposphere
Middle schoolers Use data sets from MY NASA DATA to produce graphs comparing monthly and yearly ozone averages of several U.S. cities. They analyze and evaluate the data and predict trends based on the data. In addition, they discuss and...
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Why is the Sky Blue?
Students explore diffusion or scattering of light. For this physics lesson, students explain why the sky is blue and sunsets/sunrises are red.
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"Investigating Soil Color and Texture"
Ninth graders will identify/understand the differences between soil and dirt. They will classify soil color accurately and use Munsell notation to describe it (Munsell books provided).Students will classify soil texture using the feel...
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Rocks and Minerals
In this earth science worksheet, students use the clues given at the bottom of the sheet to solve the crossword puzzle on mineral and rocks. They identify the various types of rocks formed and specific examples of these rocks.
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The Nitrogen Cycle
Learners design and create a compost pile in order to study the Nitrogen Cycle. They then use the scientific method to determine if plants grow better when they add organic matter from their compost pile to the plant's soil.
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Rocks Worksheet #2
Topping the page is a chart of crystal size and mineral composition of several different igneous rocks. Geology whizzes answer five multiple choice questions after analyzing the information in the chart. This is a simple, but sufficient...
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Cyanobacteria Races: Cyanobacteria Motility Experiment for a Classroom
Students experiment to determine the effect of light on cyanobacteria movement. They graph the data of the experiment for further analysis. They watch a time-lapse video of cyanobacteria motility at a NASA website.
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Gingerbread Spacecraft
Students explore the different parts of the Cassini spacecraft. In this space science lesson, students create a model of the spacecraft using food products. They compare and contrast their model with the real one and evaluate its...
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Modeling the Rock Cycle
Students explore the differences in sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous rocks. They discuss the rock cycle of the different formations. Students discuss how rock is formed into different shapes. They explore, predict, and create each...
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Soil Layers
Ninth graders identify the different layers of soil. In this earth science lesson, 9th graders explain how limestone layers are formed. They identify the different parts of the coral colony.
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Aerology- The Study of Mars
Learners investigate various aspects of the planet Mars. They examine a core sample that is simulated to make observations. Then compare the known sample with one that is unknown and differentiate between the two. Students hypothesize...
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Plate Tectonics: Recycling the Seafloor
Students classify earth's layers and plates using Ocean Seismicity data. In this plate tectonics lesson, students outline where the plate boundaries are on the world map. They then compare these predicted boundaries with USGS map of the...
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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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Air and Water in the Environment
Young scholars demonstrate an awareness of air as a substance that surrounds us and takes up space, and whose movement we feel as wind. They predict and describe how local weather conditions affect living things, including themselves.
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Earth Structure and Materials
Students explain what is meant by term nuclear radiation, describe in detail electromagnetic spectrum, differentiate between ionizing and non-ionizing radiation, understand half-life of isotopes, differentiate between processes of...
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Graham Cracker Plate Tectonics
For this plate tectonics worksheet, students use Graham crackers, frosting, water and a paper plate to simulate tectonic processes such as convergent, divergent and transforming plate boundaries.
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Areology-The Study of Mars
Students examine core samples from Mars and discover what they can use it to tell the history of Mars. In this core sample instructional activity students create and analyze their own core samples then eat them at the end.
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The Rock and Fossil Record-Science Puzzlers, Twisters & Teasers
In this earth science worksheet, learners complete 12 questions about rocks and fossils in the form of anagrams, riddles, sequences, and brain teasers.
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Advanced Matching--Land Formations Part 1
Using this activity, learners could review information they have covered about land forms, such as hills, mountains and plateaus. This 17 question activity could be used with upper elementary or ESL students to test or review information...
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Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs
Fourth graders participate in an activity which introduces them to common types of precipitation. They examine "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" through a teacher read aloud and make a weather pamphlet.
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Water Layering and Circulation
Students examine relationships and interactions between different types of water. They experiment with colored water of different temperature and salinity and discuss how the results relate to real ocean currents.
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Getting to the Core of Climate Change
Students investigate climate changes by graphing and analyzing ice core data from Greenland and Antarctica. They create, explain and report the pattern of data on a graph of ice core data. In addition they find relationships between the...
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Comparison Activities
Young scholars explore the size of the sun and it's temperature. Using the Internet, students visit given websites to compare the sun's diameter, outer layers, and mass to visual items young scholars can relate to. They also compare...