Social Media Toolbox
Why Social Media?
Is social media the best way to convey news in your school? Young journalists dig deep into the social media question in the second of 16 lessons from The Social Media Toolbox. After learning about the relationship between social media...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Tennis Anyone?
After reading up on the history of sports racquets, engineering teams design and construct a racquet for batting a Velcro-striped ball at a target. Teams evaluate their design by aiming for the target three times each and answering...
Illustrative Mathematics
How Thick Is a Soda Can II?
Science, technology, and math come together in this one combination exercise. Analyzing the common soda can from both a purely mathematical perspective and a scientific angle allows for a surprisingly sophisticated comparison of...
Rainforest Alliance
Sounds of the Rainforest
Do you hear what I hear? Encourage scholars to use their listening skills and participate in a series of activities that demonstrate how the sense of hearing is crucial to the human and animal world. Activities guide learners on nature...
Code.org
Good and Bad Data Visualizations
Good versus bad data. Pairs rate online collections of data representations from good to bad and then suggest ways to improve the visualizations. The class then creates a list of best practices and common errors in data representations...
TryEngineering
Solving a Simple Maze
Solve a maze ... from a robot's point of view. In the lesson, your scholars build a small, simple maze from cardboard and then find a route from the start point to the finish point. They write an algorithmic process that a robot could...
Tech Museum of Innovation
Tree House Escape
Use simple machines to escape from a tree house. Pupils learn about simple machines and how they are useful in everyday life in a STEM lesson. Groups then design a device to rescue a friend stuck in a tree house.
Code.org
Hard Problems – Traveling Salesperson Problem
Even computers find this to be a hard problem. In the eighth installment of a 12-part unit, young computer scientists learn about the traveling salesperson problem. They formulate algorithms to solve the problem and find out why it is...
DiscoverE
Harmless Holder
Here's a lesson that's not for the birds! Scholars design and build packaging for soda cans that is environmentally friendly. These packages must be durable, easy to carry, and have no environmental impact.
Social Media Toolbox
Social Media Usage
Is there a difference in the way organizations present news via social media and in print? The third in a series of 16 lessons from The Social Media Toolbox explores news outlets and their delivery methods. Groups follow a story for a...
Curated OER
Book: Finland
Students, after reading Chapter One in the book, "Finland," design and create in the computer lab a wildlife journal from an imaginary trip to Finland. They include different animals and plants that live in Finland as well as describing...
EngageNY
TASC Transition Curriculum: Workshop 9
Here's a workshop for teachers that rocks the academic world! Using earthquakes as a medium for instruction, educators learn about crosscutting engineering with science. Fun, hands-on, collaborative exercises encourage participants to...
Curated OER
Missing in MiG Alley
Students consider how technology impacted American conflicts. In this technological advances lesson, students read, "The Changing Face of War," and then describe how technology made differences in World War I, World War II, the Korean...
Curated OER
I Feel Renewed!
Students participate in a simulation of the equal and unequal distribution of the earth's renewable resources. They discuss renewable resources and how food resources can increase and decrease, participate in the simulation, and analyze...
Curated OER
Is That Natural?
Students examine how they use and waste natural resources. They participate in a class discussion about natural resources, in small groups complete a worksheet identifying ways students misuse natural resources, and create an...
Curated OER
Design a Recycling Game!
Students discover that recycling is using a product more than once so that natural resources can be saved and so that we won't need so many garbage dumps and landfills. They see that there are different ways to recycle. Students design a...
Curated OER
What Makes a Cat a Cat?
Learners investigate the lives of pets by videotaping them. In this animal life lesson, students videotape a cat and other pets using school cameras in a computer lab. Learners review the footage from the cat and other animals and...
Teach Engineering
Racing With the Sun - Creating a Solar Car
Here's an exciting and innovative lesson that's sure to get your charges fired up! In it, they use engineering design principles to construct and test a fully solar powered car. One caveat: the kits that each group needs to make their...
Teach Engineering
Design Step 6: Evaluate/Manufacture a Final Product
This is what all of the excitement has been building up to! Young engineers create engineering drawings, use machines to manufacture their products, test, and evaluate their designs in the last step in the engineering design process.
Curated OER
Ethanol Fermentation
Biofuel is a possible form of clean and renewable energy. Engineering explorers observe the fermentation process, and then alter the temperature to discover the effect on fermentation. The plan is complete with materials, procedures, and...
PBS
NOVA Sun Lab Lesson Plan
Looking for a sun-sational multi-lesson plan full of videos, simulations, and discussion? Introduce your young scientists to all things solar with a four-part hands-on adventure. Pupils learn the basics of solar anatomy, space weather,...
Curated OER
Computer Rules
Students examine the rules of computer sharing rules of respect in this instructional activity. They discuss the legalities of respecting the work of others that is stored and saved on the computer/internet. They discuss the rules of...
Curated OER
TE Activity: The Great Divide
Students simulate the distribution of nonrenewable energy resources using cookies. They determine how the world's growing population effects the equitable distribution of these resources. They look at how engineers work to develop...
Curated OER
Exploring 'Wild' Places With GIS
Students explore "wild" places. In this technology instructional activity students use ArcGIS Explorer to investigate wild places near them in their neighborhood. Students view the landscape from both above and the ground.