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Bat Echolocation is one of a series of Data Point resources from HHMI Biointeractive. Data Points engage student in analyzing and interpreting data from primary literature in the biological sciences. The resources are intended to provide authentic phenomena to spark student discussion and exploration, but they can also serve as three-dimensional assessment items. In this resource, students ana ...

The Plants unit (approximately 16 hours of instructional time), part of the Carbon TIME curriculum, builds on student learning about organic and inorganic materials in the Systems and Scale unit as well as the processes learned in the Animals Unit, including how all systems exist at multiple scales and the transformation of materials and energy during chemical change. In the Plants Unit students l ...

This is one of 25 assessment probes from the book,” Uncovering Student Ideas in Life Science, Volume 1: 25 New Formative Assessment Probes”, by Page Keeley. All assessment probes in this collection are aligned to a particular science concept and field-tested by several teachers in classes of diverse student backgrounds. The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ...

“Beetle Battles” is one lesson from the Data Nuggets website. Data Nuggets are lessons that originated from a partnership of teachers and scientists to address both the needs of scientists to share their research broadly and improve their communication skills and the needs of teachers for authentic resources that help students engage in the practice of science. Data Nuggets give studen ...

This data analysis activity includes all supporting materials including color photos of leaf sets that can be analyzed by students. The leaf sets show the results (including controls) of what happens to ivy leaves under a variety of conditions, such as the absence of sunlight and in a plastic bag to limit CO2 intake, as well as the results from starch tests done on the leaves exposed to each con ...

This activity demonstrates the effect of changes in the environment on the growth of plants. The plants are placed in environments such as high salinity, cold, heat, or drought and observe the different reactions (growth) of the plants to these conditions. Students discuss the desirability of breeding new types of plants that are better able to withstand these changes if they occur in the general ...

The ability to explain the processes by which plants capture, store and use energy for growth and development is fundamental to understanding bioenergy. In this set of lessons, students investigate how plants harness and use different sources of energy during germination and growth. Students ask questions and make predictions about the sources of energy that plants use. They then plan and carry ou ...

A resource specifically aimed to improve the content knowledge of an educator who plans to teach about the flow of matter and energy in ecosystems. Gives thorough explanation through text, graphics, and animations of all relevant ideas and how all of the information fits together. This resource also identifies common misconceptions that students often have with these topics and how the teacher can ...

This is one of many lessons provided by the California Academy of Sciences whose mission is to bring science to life in the classroom.In this activity, students learn about plant reproduction and use real data on flowers and the pollinators that visit them to construct explanations about which flowers are the most attractive to six pollinators: butterfly, bird, bat, bee, moth, and flies. The struc ...

This Formative Assessment Probe from The “Uncovering Student Ideas” series is a great way to engage the students to consider how plants get energy and what would be considered “food” for a plant. Used at the start of a lesson progression, this probe allows the teacher to determine what students think and misconceptions they may have about the processes of photosynthesis an ...

This is one of 25 assessment probes from the book,” Uncovering Student Ideas in Life Science, Volume 1: 25 New Formative Assessment Probes”, by Page Keeley. All assessment probes in this collection are aligned to a particular science concept and field-tested by several teachers in classes of diverse student backgrounds. The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ...

Students design and conduct simple experiments using elodea (aquatic plant sold in pet stores) and Bromthymol blue to determine whether plants consume or release carbon dioxide in the process of photosynthesis. Students will record their data which will be used to conclude whether carbon dioxide was consumed or released by the elodea. Through class discussion of student data, students will learn t ...

Students work in pairs to compare five aspects of an organism that reproduces sexually, asexually, or both sexually and asexually. The activity comes with a chart for the students to fill out and with information sheets on twelve organisms. As a class, students share their comparisons and generate a list of general characteristics for each mode of reproduction and then discuss the advantages and d ...

Lab 14 Variation in Traits: How Do Beetle Traits Vary Within and Across Species? is one lab from the NSTA Press book, Argument-Driven Inquiry in Life Science. This lab introduces students to the variation that occurs within beetle species and among closely related species by comparing three representative species. Students are provided with the opportunity to explore the ways beetles vary physica ...

Lab 4: Cell Structure, is one of a series of lab investigations for the middle school student from the book, "Argument-Driven Inquiry in Life Science: Lab Investigations for Grades 6-8". Students are introduced to The Cell Theory, design a simple experiment, and engage in argumentation. "Checkout Questions" are provided to facilitate student reflection on what was learned. ...

This is a sequence of lessons that have been developed to help middle school students learn and argue about the core concept of how a plant root grows at the cellular level. The first part of the sequence begins with a corn seed germination activity and the initial phase of teaching the students argumentation. The second part of the sequence consists of a microscope investigation to provide data u ...

This lab activity introduces students to the process of meiosis at the chromosomal level. The guiding question for the investigation is: How does the process of meiosis reduce the number of chromosomes in reproductive cells? Students develop an explanatory model based on their knowledge of mitosis and how cells divide. Students are provided with pictures showing various stages of meiosis. Students ...

Movement of Molecules Into and Out of Cells is one of a series of activities from "Scientific Argumentation in Biology: 30 Classroom Activities. Movement of Molecules engages students in planning and carrying out investigations, modeling, engaging in argument from evidence, and communication. After observing a figure of magnified red blood cells, and a figure of magnified red blood cells w ...

In this lesson, students become bioengineers, trying to effectively and safely restore “blood flow” through a model clogged artery. Background work, including dissection ideas, provides students with an understanding of circulatory system anatomy; it also piques their interest in heart disease and current technologies to combat it. The teacher establishes a problem: blockage of a coron ...

This lesson is a collaboration between the Lego Group and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Edgerton Center. The LEGO bricks provide kinesthetic experiences for students to model the process of photosynthesis. The phenomenon of this lesson is to figure out how plants gain mass. The lesson first elicits students prior knowledge then helps students understand that the primary source of plan ...

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 where most of the matter that makes up the stem and leaves of a plant originates. The lesson engages students by presenting the phenomenon of small sunflower seeds growing into tall flowering plant ...

This online unit explores the theme of the National Zoo's Pollinarium exhibition: how plant and animal partners interact to accomplish pollination. It is a series of three lessons that allow the learner to explore and develop an understanding of the relationship between flowers and bees to accomplish successful plant reproductions. Lesson 1: Identify the plant parts involved in reproduction, i ...

This resource is the fourth in a series of interactive simulations that help students make sense of human responses. In this activity, students are experimenting to see which of their senses (sight, sound, or touch) has the fastest response time. Students investigate the response time of each of these senses using the interactive simulations. This lesson is designed to be done individually and ...

In this activity, the learner explores various ways in which organisms reproduce. The learner discusses the role that reproduction plays in the cycle of life. By watching short videos and participating in follow-up discussion: 1. They observe that no individual organism lives forever and in order to continue species, organisms must pass their genetic instructions on to the next generation. 2. They ...

This is one activity out of the Project Learning Tree Pre K-8 Environmental Education Activity Guide. Project Learning Tree® (PLT) is a program of the Sustainable Forestry Initiative that offers high-quality instructional materials for grades PreK-12 to increase students’ understanding of the environment and actions they can take to conserve it. This lesson is STEM activity #43 entitled ...

Animation that teaches how plant-based foods get their starch and how humans use the starches to make energy. Site also has limited follow up questions and other information on the vocabulary used. This is a great resource for showing the dynamics of photosynthesis and leads to cellular respiration at a middle-level appropriate level. This is not a complete NGSS lesson but could be used as part of ...

This two and a half minute video from the California Academy of Sciences shows seasonal variation in primary productivity, both on land and in the ocean, as seen from space. The visualization is based on empirical scientific data collected over time. The phenomenon could engage students along with the following driving questions: What factors control changes in primary productivity over time, o ...

This is a three-lesson unit that is part of a nationwide effort to monitor bird nesting and reproductive success. This unit provides students with enough background to participate in citizen science and is connected with Cornell University Ornithology Lab. Students explore how characteristic bird behaviors affect the probability of successful reproduction as they investigate the phenomenon of diff ...