Texas State Energy Conservation Office
Investigation: Water Wheel
Middle school scientists construct a working water wheel from an aluminum pie pan. Because of the sharp edges on the cut aluminum, this activity is for mature learners only. You could have your class compete to see whose wheel can lift...
TED-Ed
What is the World Wide Web?
Did you know that the World Wide Web and the Internet are not the same thing? Did you know that Tim Berners-Lee is considered the father of the Web? Networks, web servers, web hosts, website addresses, domain names, web languages,...
Skyscraper Museum
Building a Skyscraper
The construction of skyscrapers is no simple undertaking, involving the careful coordination and planning of many different people. The third lesson in this series explores this detailed process by first teaching children about the main...
Skyscraper Museum
Building a Skyscraper
Creating buildings that reach hundreds of feet into the sky is no easy task. The third instructional activity in this series begins with four activities that engage young architects in exploring the major challenges that are faced when...
Skyscraper Museum
Designing a Skyscraper
Besides serving as awe-inspiring monuments of human achievement, skyscrapers are built to perform a wide range of functions in urban communities. The second lesson in this series begins by exploring the history of the Empire State...
Skyscraper Museum
What is a Skyscraper?
Skyscrapers are amazing feats of architectural design that create the iconic skylines of the world's biggest cities. Young architects explore the defining characteristics of these monstrous towers with the first lesson in this four-part...
Discovery Education
Clutter Cutter
Challenge young learners to cut the clutter with this fun engineering project. As employees of a home and office supply company, young engineers are asked to develop devices that organize everyday items. After participating in a...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Engineer a Dam
To begin the learning about dams, learners read (or are read to, depending on the age group) a passage about how dams work. Next, they work in groups to use the materials provided to build a small scale working dam. After the experience,...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Working with Wind Energy
After reading about how wind turbines work to collect clean energy, groups brainstorm and design their own windmill. Within the provided financial and physical constraints, groups must build a working windmill using only the materials...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Failure: Seeds of Innovation
"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!" Through this assignment, emerging engineers examine how failed experiments are simply part of the process of an outstanding design. They begin with some reading about the microwave oven,...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Chair Lift Challenge
During the Winter Olympics, this would be an engaging task to include in your STEM lesson. Design teams plan, construct, and test a miniature ski lift that can carry a pingpong ball up and down a rope line without falling out. With this...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Radio Reception and Transmission
After reading about radio transmission, application, and the difference between AM and FM, small teams of engineers use a kit to construct an FM radio and then send and receive broadcasts. This is an ideal activity for middle school STEM...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Arduino Blink Challenge
Emerging engineers read about Arduino software and how it can be used. Then they follow a nine-step tutorial to connect an Arduino board to a computer and put it to work! The objective is to code a program that will cause an LED to...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Stop and Go
It's "Green light, go!" with this lesson! STEM classes are illuminated with the history of traffic signals and how the engineering design has improved over time. They also learn about patents for new inventions. Finally, they research in...
Flagstaff Arts & Leadership Academy
PowerPoint Project “All About Me”
Get to know each individual while implementing technology practice and use. Each pupil creates a presentation about him or herself that follows a concrete list of requirements. While presenting, the instructor and peers rank the...
Common Sense Media
All Digital Citizens Poster
What do digital citizens do? Make sure your kids are using their heads, hearts, guts, and even their feet to be excellent digital citizens! The poster includes an image of a child with certain body parts highlighted. These body parts are...
Common Sense Media
Digital Citizenship Pledge Poster
How can your class members show their dedication to digital citizenship? Have them read, add to, and sign this poster. Among several speech bubbles filled in with ways to be an excellent digital citizen are two blank bubbles that you can...
Common Sense Media
Care and Maintenance Poster
Working with tablet computers in your class? Ensure that your pupils take care of their devices or those that belong to your school or district. This poster lists five easy guidelines for kids to follow when using a mobile device...
Showbie
Student Clicker - Socrative
Ask your class a question, and they can submit their responses in no time. Just like that, their work has been sent to you for review. Try out this super-simple app to increase engagement and inform instruction.
Khan Academy
Bonus Project: Custom Clothing
Clothing design, do you know any teenagers that are interested in that? How about mixing what they have learned about JavaScript programing and the creativity of designing a piece of clothing? This activity does just that. Practice the...
Curated OER
Challenge: Tasty Tomato
Take a big bite out of the red tomato by practicing your use of the variables mouseX and mouseY in a JavaScript coding task. The activity will guide you step-by-step and will help young coders understand how to draw objects based on the...
Khan Academy
Challenge: Mickey Mouse Ears
My, what big ears you have! Novice JavaScript programmers adjust Mickey's ears to be proportional with his face and any changes to it. The key is to use variable expressions so that the values used are dependent upon the variable that...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
A Question of Balance
It's a neat idea, but the task of designing a system for filling jars with consistent specific amounts of a product may be a little out of reach, especially for younger pupils. Intended as an engineering design lesson, this may be better...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Be a Scanning Probe Microscope
Extensive reading is done in order to learn about scanning probe microscopy and nanoscale. Afterward, individuals use a pencil to probe an unidentified object that is inside of a box so that they cannot see it. Using only what they could...