Noyce Foundation
Building Blocks
Building blocks have more uses than simply entertaining children. Young mathematicians calculate the volume of a given cube, and then calculate the volume and surface area of a prism formed from multiple cubes.
American Chemical Society
The Energy Efficiency of Heating Water
Can a small change in laboratory procedures save energy? Scholars test three different methods for heating water in a science lab. Then, they calculate the energy efficiency for each and compare them to determine which uses the least...
Royal Society of Chemistry
Mass Concentration of Solutions
Ready to teach your class about molar mass and solution concentration? Make time for an interactive resource that will challenge their reasoning and problem-solving skills. Science scholars calculate the molarity of several solutions...
101 Questions
Trashketball
Take a shot using a lesson on volume! Young learners watch a video showing a trashcan filling with paper balls. The task is to calculate the number of paper balls that will fit in the can. Pupils use volume calculations to make a...
Concord Consortium
All-in-All Problems
Graphs, functions, symbols, and more! Use these strategies to model everything from the flow of a river to the number of cars passing a toll booth. Presented differently but solved similarly, learners consider five different scenarios...
University of Georgia
Bag O' Isotopes
Accommodate your chemistry class with an experiment that is both entertaining and educational. Through the activity, blossoming chemists perform calculations on various isotopes, as represented by beans and legumes, to obtain...
EngageNY
Getting a Handle on New Transformations 1
In the first of a two-day lesson on transformations with matrix notation the class transforms the unit square using general transformations, then calculates the area of the transformed image. They discover it is the same as finding...
Beyond Benign
Green"er" Precipitation Reaction
All sodium carbonate may not have the same amount of carbonate, but it should have the same percent. Learners write and balance an equation to predict the chemical reaction between sodium carbonate and zinc acetate. Through the lab...
101 Questions
Pool Bounce
Use geometry to improve your pool game! Learners analyze the front half of a pool shot to determine its resulting path. By measuring the angle of incidence, they are able to predict the path of the ball.
Statistics Education Web
When 95% Accurate Isn’t
Investigate the effect of false positives on probability calculation with an activity that asks scholars to collect simulated data generated by a calculator. To finish, participants analyze the probability of certain outcomes which lead...
Curated OER
Repeating Decimal as Approximation
You are used to teaching repeating decimals with bar notation that keeps us from writing that number over and over again; now teach what the over and over again represents. This activity allows your mathematicians to explore the infinite...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
What van Leeuwenhoek Saw
When van Leeuwenhoek saw cells and single-celled organisms for the first time, he knew these small things were a big deal! Share his discoveries with young learners through a narrated video, model-building activity, and scale study....
Noyce Foundation
Baseball Players
Baseball is all about statistics. Pupils solve problems related to mean, median, and range. They calculate the total weight of players given the mean weight, calculate the mean weight of reserve players given the mean weight of the...
Illustrative Mathematics
Satellite
Learners practice relating rules of trigonometry and properties of circles. With a few simplifying assumptions such as a perfectly round earth, young mathematicians calculate the lengths of various paths between satellite and...
Ed Migliore
Linear Equations in Two Variables
This traditional textbook style unit includes vocabulary, a direct explanation section, examples, practice problems that directly line up with the explanations and examples, and a unit summary review and practice problems. Learners get...
Teach Engineering
Earthquakes Living Lab: Finding Epicenters and Measuring Magnitudes
Pairs use an online simulation to determine the epicenter and magnitude of an earthquake. Using real data about the earthquake's maximum S wave amplitudes, they then determine the magnitude. The resource provides a great career...
Inside Mathematics
Archery
Put the better archer in a box. The performance task has pupils compare the performance of two archers using box-and-whisker plots. The resource includes sample responses that are useful in comparing individuals' work to others.
Inside Mathematics
Conference Tables
Pupils analyze a pattern of conference tables to determine the number of tables needed and the number of people that can be seated for a given size. Individuals develop general formulas for the two growing number patterns and...
Statistics Education Web
The Egg Roulette Game
Hard boiled or raw? Which egg will you get? A hands-on activity has scholars explore the impact of conditional probability. Based on a skit from the Tonight Show, pupils model the selection of the two types of eggs using beads. They...
Virginia Department of Education
Solution Concentrations
What happens when you combine 6.022 times 10 to the 23 piles of dirt into one? You make a mountain out of a mole hill. Scholars use dehydration to obtain percent composition and then calculate the molarity of the original...
Consumers Energy
The Cost of Electricity
How much is your toaster costing you every day? Young environmentalists calculate the monetary costs of household appliances based on their average consumption of wattage.
EngageNY
Matrix Arithmetic in Its Own Right
Matrix multiplication can seem random to pupils. Here's a instructional activity that uses a real-life example situation to reinforce the purpose of matrix multiplication. Learners discover how to multiply matrices and relate the process...
Noyce Foundation
Gym
Give the class a mental work out with an assessment task in which young mathematicians compare several gym membership options. They use substitution to calculate the cost for given numbers of months.
Noyce Foundation
Percent Cards
Explore different representations of numbers. Scholars convert between fractions, decimals, and percents, and then use these conversions to plot the values on a horizontal number line.