Curated OER
Sky 3: Modeling Shadows
Students will construct models to demonstrate their understanding of shadows. Many questions and suggestions for variants on the activities are presented to allow you to tailor this instructional activity to your particular needs. It is...
Curated OER
Cooler in the Shadows
Students explore how the amount of sunlight and heat change in areas that are shaded.
Curated OER
Me And My Shadow
Students investigate the concept of a shadow. They design a tool to create shadows for an experiment. They make observations and record the size and shape of shadows. The lesson contains background information for the teacher to deliver...
Purdue University
Global Design for the Seasons
People don't all get the same amount of sun at the same time of the year. Collaborative groups explore how the motion of Earth contributes to the idea in an inquiry-based STEM lesson. Learners first investigate how the rotation of Earth...
NOAA
The Great, Glowing Orb What You Will Do: Make a Solar Heat Engine
How is solar energy able to move wind and water to control the climate? Scholars explore the concept of solar energy in the first of 10 activities in the Discover Your Changing World series. They follow instructions to build homemade...
Curated OER
Sun, Shadows, Surface Structure...and the Face on Mars
Young scholars use light and shadow information to make inferences regarding the three dimensional shapes of specific objects photographed on the surface of Mars. Limitations of the of the data provided are discussed and entries made...
Space Science Institute
The "All American" Eclipse Guide
Are you ready for the biggest astronomical event of the year? More importantly ... are you ready to share it with your scholars? Use a presentation filled with facts and diagrams to make sure everyone in class understands the importance...
Curated OER
My Antonia: During Reading Strategy
Home in on the quote on this page to explore setting, the author's and character's voices, and plot in Willa Cather's My Antonia. Pupils draw a picture of what is described in the quote, discuss the content, and make connections to their...
Curated OER
Timekeeping by the Sun
Students measure shadows to learn about the Sun-Earth relationship. In this astronomy instructional activity, students create a shadow stick of a Pokemon character and record measurements of its shadow in a data chart. Follow-up...
Curated OER
Only the Shadow Knows
Students become familiar with the causes for formation of shadows. They create shadows, compare the size and shape of the shadow with the actual object, engage in shadow play theatre, and discover what happens to shadows when there is...
Curated OER
Earth, Sun, and Moon
Young scholars participate in a demonstration and complete an online activity that illustrates the earth orbits the sun once a year, and that the moon takes approximately 28 days to orbit the earth.
Curated OER
Tracking the Sun with a Solar Dome
Students study the sun and how it moves throughout the day. In this tracking the sun lesson students create a model of the celestial sphere.
Curated OER
Tides, Eclipses, Day and Night, and Seasons
In this earth science worksheet, students use the clues given at the bottom of the sheet to complete the crossword puzzle on tides, eclipses, day and night, and the seasons of the year. There are 17 clues to solve in the puzzle.
PBS
NASA's Eyes on the 2017 Eclipse
How did the 2017 eclipse look in Los Angeles—or Chicago? Experience both views, plus many more, using a lesson from PBS's Space series for middle schoolers. Scholars follow the movements of the sun, moon, and Earth during the most recent...
Curated OER
Astronomy with a Stick
Students describe the movement of the Earth as it relates to the sun and
formulate a hypothesis for the movement and the changing length of the shadow. They express the relationship between the sun and the Earth and how that causes the...
Scholastic
Groundhog Day
A simple activity for a simple, but special, holiday. Young learners read a brief history of Groundhog Day, practice reading aloud, and then discuss how shadows are formed.
Curated OER
Light
Here is a stellar slide show for illuminating middle schoolers' minds on the topic of light! An interactive slide allows viewers to sort light sources by whether or not they are man-made. More objects are displayed and learners discover...
Radford University
Trouble in the Orchard
It's no fun catching a fungus. Scholars first investigate how the seasons affect the angle of the sun and the lengths of shadows. They then apply right triangle trigonometry to determine the height of trees based on their shadows to...
BBC
Sound and Hearing
First and second graders recognize that sound is generated in a variety of ways, and that it comes from many different sources. They explore tone and volume, realizing that there are different ways to describe sound. Some musical...
Curated OER
Cameras and Shadows
Students discover how light creates shadows by photographing them with a camera. In this sunlight lesson, students utilize the light in the sky to create different shadows of themselves and objects near their classroom,...
Curated OER
Cut and Paste Moon Phases Activity
In this phases of the moon learning exercise, students are given pictures of the phases of the moon and they cut them out and paste them to a diagram with the names of the phases. They answer questions about the moon, the phases and the...
Curated OER
Labs from Chicago, Summer 1993: Calibrating the Sun's Light
Students experiment with the luminosity of the Sun's light. In this luminosity lesson, students participate in an experiment with luminosity of the sun and flashlights. They make filters and fiber optic sources.
Curated OER
Shadow Trackers
Pupils use online websites to inquire about the cycle of day and night. In this web based lesson, students are able to see the movement of the sun and Earth. Pupils can look at different parts of the Earth as if they were on the Sun or...
Curated OER
Sky 2: Shadows
students will explore making shadows and tracking the movement of an object over the course of a day to look for patterns. It is best to couple this shadow activity with reading the book, Bear Shadow, and making a map of Bear's...