Science Matters
Potential and Kinetic Energy
Everything has potential energy; learning to use it is the key to understanding all types of energy. Scholars learn the difference between kinetic and potential energy. They then apply the concept to drawing examples of both types...
NOAA
A Quest for Anomalies
Sometimes scientists learn more from unexpected findings than from routine analysis! Junior oceanographers dive deep to explore hydrothermal vent communities in the fourth instructional activity in a series of five. Scholars examine data...
Curated OER
A Look at Exclusion Through Improvisation
Building a realistic understanding of the trials Jews suffered during WWII isn't always easy. This plan employs student constructed dramatic freeze frame scenes to help build a deeper understanding of Jewish Ghettos, concentration camps,...
Curated OER
Children Are...
Pupils apply prior knowledge to various articles, topics, and situations.
Curated OER
Spider "How To" Make a Spider
Young chefs follow the set-by-step instructions of a recipe and use their prior knowledge of the body parts of a spider to make edible spider cookies. After completing a pre-writing graphic organizer they then write a "how to"...
Curated OER
Sustainable Southern Belize: Coral Health Lesson Plan
Fifth graders investigate coral reefs and the dangers they face by labeling and drawing. In this oceanography activity, 5th graders view a PowerPoint presentation of photographs of coral reefs in Belize. Students investigate...
Teach Engineering
Storing Android Accelerometer Data: App Design
There's an app for that! Pupils learn to build an app that will store data on an Android. The lesson plan introduces class members to the tiny database, TinyDB, for Android devices. A video tutorial provides an example that...
Curated OER
Child Safety
Explore reading comprehension and child safety in this young adult literacy lesson plan. High schoolers practice using context clues to figure out word meanings after observing a teacher model this process. They read an article about...
Curated OER
Fractions, Decimals, and Percentages Got You Down? "Tri" This!
Young scholars explore number sense by creating a math presentation in class. In this parts of a whole lesson plan, students define and discuss the relationship between fractions, decimals and percentages before completing a problem...
EngageNY
Linear Transformations Review
Time for matrices and complex numbers to come together. Individuals use matrices to add and multiply complex numbers by a scalar. The instructional activity makes a strong connection between the operations and graphical transformations.
Curated OER
Prime Factorization: Finding Factors in the Fifth Grade
The lesson starts out with a brain drain, which is a great way to get students to activate prior knowledge and build lasting connections. They tell everything they know about prime factorization, use their knowledge to...
Alabama Learning Exchange
Miss Integer Finds Her Properties in Order
Access prior knowledge to practice concepts like order of operations and exponents. Your class can play this game as a daily review or as a warm-up activity when needed. They work in groups of four to complete and correct review problems.
Curated OER
American Flag History
Young historians explore US culture by investigating the US flag. They will use their textbooks, prior knowledge, and sources provided by the teacher to research the history of the American flag. They will design and create a trading...
Curated OER
Insects and Bugs
Students recognize the difference between insects and bugs while making connections to personal experiences. In this insect and bug lesson, students complete a pre-assessment to demonstrate prior knowledge, then gather information...
National Endowment for the Humanities
The War in the North, 1775–1778
Using primary source documents, including maps, learners examine Revolutionary War events from 1775 to 1778. The focus here is on the challenges George Washington and the Continental army faced and how they persevered in spite of those...
West Contra Costa Unified School District
Introduction to Conditional Probability
Here is a turnkey lesson that walks young statisticians through the development and uses of conditional probability. From dice games to surveys, Venn diagrams to frequency tables, the class learns how a given can effect the overall...
West Contra Costa Unified School District
Introduction to Inverse Functions
Ready to share the beauty of the inverse function with your classes? This algebra II activity guides the discovery of an inverse function through a numerical, graphical, and an algebraic approach. Connections are made between the three,...
EngageNY
Scale Factors
Is it bigger, or is it smaller—or maybe it's the same size? Individuals learn to describe enlargements and reductions and quantify the result. Lesson five in the series connects the creation of a dilated image to the result. Pupils...
EngageNY
Linear Transformations Applied to Cubes
What do you get when you combine a matrix and a cube? Well that depends on the matrix! Pupils use online software to graph various transformations of a cube. Ultimately, they are able to describe the matrix that is responsible for a...
National Research Center for Career and Technical Education
Break-Even Point
How do companies determine the prices of their products? Marketing maestros discover the concepts of cost and break-even point through discussion, independent practice, and a collaborative assessment. The career and technology-oriented...
Curated OER
Picturing America: Images and Words of Hope from Romare Bearden and Langston Hughes
A carefully crafted three-day lesson integrates poetry and visual art. By analyzing and comparing Langston Hughes' poem "Mother and Son" and Romare Bearden's collage "The Dove," readers explore the theme of hope. The lesson activates...
Curated OER
Writing Process- Expository Writing
Expository writing is the focus of the language arts instructional activity presented here. In it, young writers review what expository writing is through a class discussion and teacher demonstration. Then, learners write expository text...
West Contra Costa Unified School District
Factoring Quadratic Expressions
Factor in different strategies in a instructional activity for factoring quadratics. Young mathematicians first create tables and area models to factor quadratic trinomials into two binomials by guess and check. Learners then investigate...
University of Colorado
Looking Inside Planets
Researchers use scientific data to understand what is inside each of the planets. The first in a series of six, this lesson builds off of that concept by having pupils use a data table to create their own scale models of the interiors of...