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This activity is a hands-on simulation using Skittles and mini-marshmallows to show how natural selection can act as a mechanism to increase the presence of antibacterial resistance in a population. Students simulate the effect of hand sanitizer on a population of bacteria, collect, record, graph and analyze their data. The bacteria that are affected by the selective pressure decrease and the popu ...

This is Activity 12 of a set of Level 1 activities designed by the Science Center for Teaching, Outreach, and Research on Meteorology (STORM) Project. The authors suggest that previous activities in the unit be completed before Activity 12: Air Masses, including those that address pressure systems and dew point temperature. In Activity 12, the students learn about the four main types of air masses ...

This web simulation allows students to explore adaptive radiation of a fictitious group of birds called Pollenpeepers over a period of 5 million years. A hurricane blows some birds to 3 very different island groups and students identify the changes that take place over time and their causes including different climates, food, competition and predators. Each of the three island groups are compared ...

The president has sent out a memo to engineers in the state of “Alabraska”—your help is needed to save the human population from an asteroid impact! This lesson plan is the first in a series of 8 developed at the Colorado School of Mines. In this introductory lesson, students are introduced to a storyline, have to define the problem, and have to use some geology, engineering and mathematical reaso ...

This lesson plan introduces students to the process of plating one metallic object with another metal and the importance of this process in engineering applications. With parameters, students design strategies to copperplate other metal objects using pennies and a vinegar solution. After sharing their strategies with the class, students revise their plans then test their effectiveness. Groups come ...

This lesson is the second in a unit on electricity. It begins with a whole class discussion of a flashlight and how it works. Students are then challenged to light a bulb using a battery and a wire. They use science notebooks to record their progress. Students share their findings and to begin to construct an explanation of how a circuit works. They learn that an electric current requires a comple ...

This engineering design lesson focuses on the effects of erosion on Florida's coastline. It is one lesson offered within a larger weathering and erosion unit. Students groups work to create and use a model able to slow erosion, without damaging the coastal ecosystem. Students are responsible for developing scale diagram of their coastline erosion solution before building and testing their mode ...

The resource (beginning on page 15) gives excellent background information that derives the equation for the conservation of energy of a falling object. Using that background as a guide, the resource then has the students perform an experiment with a PASCO cart on a track that is pulled by a falling mass. The experiment asks the students to determine the kinetic energy of the cart and compare it t ...

In this lesson, students examine seismic evidence to determine that the Earth must have a layered internal structure and to estimate the size of Earth’s core. Students are divided into two teams (theoreticians and seismologists) to test the simplest hypothesis for what is inside of the Earth: that the Earth is homogeneous throughout. The theoretician group uses a scale model of a homogeneous ...

Students investigate which building types are structured to withstand earthquake damage. They take on the role of engineers as they design their own earthquake resistant buildings, then test them in a simulated earthquake activity. Students also develop an appreciation for the job of engineers who need to know about earthquakes and their causes in order to design resistant buildings. This lesson i ...

This lesson plan provides visual and hands-on activities provides for learners to gain knowledge about the finite amount of fresh water on Earth and encourages the discussion of the various ways to conserve this resource. The end of the lesson mentions that this lesson can also be used with NGSS 5th grade standards.

In Eclipse Interactive, students investigate both lunar and solar eclipses by manipulating up to three independent variables: Moon's tilt from orbit, Earth-Moon distance and size of the Moon. By viewing the effects of changes to these variables, students will be able to construct explanations for solar and lunar eclipses.The model includes both top and side views of the Earth-Moon system during th ...

This activity helps to demonstrate the importance of rocks, soils, and minerals in engineering and how using the right material for the right job is important. The students build 3 different sand castles composed of varying amounts of sand, water, and glue. The 'buildings' in this lesson are made of sand and glue, sand being a soil and glue being composed of different minerals.They then test them ...

This hands-on activity allows students to explore five earth forces that may cause erosion as they model, observe, and record the effects of erosion on earth surfaces. Stations include demonstrations of chemical, wind, water, ice and heat forces as they affect weathering.

A lesson plan based on the book Muncha! Muncha! Muncha! by Candace Fleming where bunnies keep getting a farmer’s vegetable garden and eating his vegetables. Students will design and build something to prevent the bunnies from getting into the vegetable garden.

Students construct a size-distance scale model for the sun, Earth, moon and stars. In addition, they use their bodies and movements to model the relationship between time and astronomical motions of Earth (rotation on its axis and orbit around the sun) as well as how these motions affect our view of objects in the sky at various times of day and year. Earth’s rotation causes day and night ...

This resource provides background information about semiconductors and photovoltaic cells. Then it has three parts to the lab activity: (1) solar cell(s) and small electric fan, (2) Lifting small masses with an electric motor, and (3) Powering a light bulb. The first activity, solar cell(s) and small electric fan, simply requires the students to create an electric circuit of their design that inco ...

In this lab activity from the book Argument-Driven Inquiry in Biology, students use an online simulation (www.fastplants.org/legacy/genetics/Introductions/two-trait.htm) to cross Wisconsin Fast Plants with different traits and identify inheritance patterns, enabling them to analyze data collected over several generations. The simulation offers the opportunity for students to visualize these data, ...

Through role-playing as a particle of water, students gain an understanding of the complexity of the movement of water through earth’s systems. Stations are set-up for nine different water reservoirs associated with the water cycle. On each turn, students roll the dice at each station and either stay in place or move to a different location. Students track their unique journey through the water cy ...

This is a lab activity involving transformations between the gravitational potential energy, elastic potential energy, and kinetic energy of a system. An air track with a glider and a photo gate timer are needed to perform the lab. The lab is divided into three separate but related parts. The first part involves using a spring to launch the glider horizontally, measuring the velocity of the glider ...

This resource presents the students with three small activities which are all disguised as challenges. The first activity, "Deactivating the Bomb," requires the students to determine how much hot water to add to a beaker of cool water so that the final temperature rises to 37 degrees Celsius. For every degree that the students miss the final temperature by, they lose a point. The second activity, ...

This is one of 30 lessons from the NSTA Press book Scientific Argumentation in Biology. The lesson engages students in an argumentation cycle in which they evaluate three alternative claims regarding whether and how plants use oxygen to obtain energy. The lesson engages students by discussing how animals use sugar to obtain energy and then opens the comparison between animals and plants. Students ...

This is a simple to use Java based simulation from PhET, University of Boulder Colorado. In this simulation the learner can manipulate several variables related to the crust and then run experiments to produce data consistent with data from actual phenomena. This resource can be used in a variety of ways in the classroom. The interactive simulation offers the user the ability to manipulate the typ ...

What is a watershed? How do our actions affect the health of a watershed? Students explore these questions by analyzing pictures and identifying watershed features. Students then make a watershed model using a plastic shower curtain, a spray bottle of water and themselves or classroom objects The objectives of the lesson are to: • Identify nonliving and living features found in a watershed. • Unde ...

This 8 minute instructional video provides a model for teachers to follow of a week long investigation of oil spills and the environmental impact they have on shorelines and creatures. Students take on the task of cleaning up a simulated oil spill. Educator uses the 5E curriculum model to engage students with fiction and non-fiction texts before exploring methods that simulate an oil spill and its ...

Solar System Scale and Size is a two-part activity that explores relative distances and sizes of objects in our Solar System using the 5E Instructional Model. In Activity 1, students are tasked with calculating relative distances to the Sun for the planets, Asteroid Belt and Pluto using information provided in a student handout. Once the calculations are complete, students use this information to ...

This resource includes three parts: a video clip from the TV show, Zoom, to introduce the activity, an essay with background information about energy, and a set of printable instructions. Students use a spool, a toothpick, a washer, a rubber band, and a pencil to build a racer. They conduct tests with the racer by varying the number of twists in the rubber band or changing other design features. T ...

This lesson engages students in exploring the phenomenon of soil erosion at the beach, and in designing solutions to mitigate it. In part one of this lesson, students research how wave energy affects shorelines, predict the relationship between waves and erosion, and use historic data to study the effects of tides and major storms on the Gulf Coast. They use videos, photos, and an online interact ...