Illustrative Mathematics
Reasoning about Multiplication and Division and Place Value, Part 1
Help your class make sense of quantities and their relationships. Given is the product of two numbers. It is up to your number crunchers to think about the quantitative relationship when the product is one-tenth or ten times the product...
Illustrative Mathematics
Running Around a Track II
On your mark, get set, GO! The class sprints toward the conclusions in a race analysis activity. The staggered start of the 400-m foot race is taken apart in detail, and then learners step back and develop some overall race strategy...
Illustrative Mathematics
How Thick Is a Soda Can I?
The humble soda can gets the geometric treatment in an activity that links math and science calculations. After a few basic assumptions are made and discussed, surface area calculations combine with density information to develop an...
Illustrative Mathematics
Joining Two Midpoints of Sides of a Triangle
Without ever using the actual term, this exercise has the learner develop the key properties of the midsegment of a triangle. This task leads the class to discover a proof of similar triangles using the properties of parallel...
University of Utah
Explore Proportional and Linear Relationships
Progress from proportional relationships to linear functions. Pupils first review concepts of proportionality covered in earlier grades. They then extend these concepts to linear functions, such as determining the slope of a...
Teach Engineering
Energy and the Pogo Stick
Let your class bounce to examine the concept elastic potential energy. Individuals bounce on a pogo stick in order to calculate its elastic potential energy. Groups then compare the elastic potential energy to the gravitational...
Education Development Center
Area and Multiplication
Take some intellectual fun and apply it to the concept of multiplying expressions together. A guide models how to break two numbers into an area model to multiply together in pieces similar to FOILing. The rest of the puzzles consist of...
Messenger Education
Give Me a Boost—How Gravity Assists Aid Space Exploration
The propellant needed for space explorations runs in the thousands, while paying to get the craft into orbit costs millions! In the second installment of three, two activities explore laws of conservation of energy and momentum. Using...
National Wildlife Federation
Branching Out – Exploring Dendrochronology
Tree rings from North America give a continuous history of El Nino intensity over the last 1,100 years. Scholars learn how scientists use tree rings to create timelines demonstrating variations in weather patterns. The cumulative...
Cornell University
Diffraction Demystified
Study diffraction patterns using CDs and DVDs! Scholars measure the diffraction patterns of a light wave as it hits a CD or DVD. Using the information, they can measure the distance between the tracks.
Cornell University
Who’s Got The Flu?
Become an immunologist for the day. Scholars elicit the use of the enzyme-linked immunoabsorbent assay (ELISA) to diagnose an infectious disease. Through the process, they learn about the immune system response to infectious diseases.
Shodor Education Foundation
Linear Inequalities
An interactive lesson helps individuals learn to graph inequalities in two variables. Scholars can adjust the interactive to present the inequalities in standard or slope-intercept form.
DiscoverE
Hidden Alarm
It's time to wake up! Young engineers build an electric circuit that will activate an alarm. The use of switches in the circuit is a must—because you don't want the alarm to keep beeping forever!
Teach Engineering
Design Inspired by Nature
Let nature guide your engineering designs. By taking apart a flower, pupils learn about reverse engineering. They use the results to brainstorm designs for new products or ideas. This is the seventh installment of a nine-part Life...
Concord Consortium
Circling Trains
And round and round the park we go! Given a description of an amusement park with the locations of three attractions connected by walkways, learners consider what happens when additional attractions join the mix by doubling the length of...
Concord Consortium
Dubious Dice
How many ways can you slice dice distribution? A short performance task asks pupils to consider different types of distributions. Given histograms showing a triangular distribution and a bimodal distribution, they create pairs of dice...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Putting on Armor
Middle schoolers learn how to protect themselves from risky behaviors with a lesson that has them role play several scenarios and demonstrate ways that they might do to stay safe. Class members then use what they have learned to build a...
Curated OER
Water Quality and Dissolved Oxygen
Students investigate the relationship between dissolved oxygen and organic materials and aquatic organisms. This is a 3-lesson series in which students explore dissolved oxygen and then design an experiment testing the effects of changes.
Curated OER
Open & Operating: The Federal Reserve Responds to September 11
Students investigate the purpose of a central bank. In this economics/consumer mathematics lesson, students explore the actions of the Federal Reserve after the events of September 11, 2001. Students investigate the role of...
Curated OER
Tic-Tac-Toe
Students investigate finite mathematics using a flow chart. In this algebra lesson, students investigate logic and strategies using flowcharts. Students compete against each other using different approaches to playing the game.
Curated OER
Bar Graphs
Third graders investigate bar graphs. In this third grade mathematics lesson, 3rd graders collect and analyze data and use the internet’s Graph challenge to create their own graphs. Students write questions for the other...
Curated OER
Order of Operations
Seventh graders investigate the order of operations. In this seventh grade mathematics instructional activity, 7th graders explore the order of operations and practice using them in activities that involve paper and pencil,...
Curated OER
Using Excel To Teach Probability And Graphing
Students engage in the use of technology to investigate the mathematical concepts of probability and graphing. They use the skills of predicting an outcome to come up with reasonable possibilities. Students also practice using a...
Curated OER
Animal Skin
Students investigate the skin surface to body area ratios for different animals. In this seventh/eighth grade mathematics/science activity, students explore heat transfer between an animal’s body and the environment. Using...