Illinois Department of Natural Resources
Section One: What is Biodiversity?
Four intriguing and scientific activities invite learners to explore the natural resources of their town. The activities cover concepts such as genetic traits, organizing species in a taxonomy, the differences between different species...
Sensory Connection Program
The Tree of Self Esteem Game
Create a respectful classroom community and boost children's self-esteem with this collaborative activity. Working in small groups, children take turns filling in each other's tree of self-esteem with compliments, personal strengths, and...
Novelinks
The Hobbit: Problematic Situation
As part of a unit study of The Hobbit, class members engage in an activity that asks group to practice the skills needed to reach consensus in a discussion.
It's About Time
Atoms with More Than One Electron
Provide young chemists with the ability to manipulate atoms and predict their results, in this sixth lesson. Pupils analyze energy patterns as they predict the amount of energy required to remove electrons from atoms. They compare trends...
BrainPOP
Civil Rights Lesson Plan: Tracking History Through Timelines
Use the accompanying assessment to determine your class's prior knowledge on Martin Luther King, Jr. before beginning a lesson plan on the famous civil rights movement leader. The resource has young historians thinking about life for...
US Institute of Peace
Defining Conflict
Conflict is everywhere—but is it avoidable? The first activity in a series of 15 peacebuilding lessons examines the nature of conflict at home, school, and across the world. Learners develop a definition of conflict through group work...
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
A Century of Plastics
After reading about polymer materials, engineer trainees examine how plastics have been integrated into everyday products. In groups, they compile a list of products made entirely without plastics and then, as a closing activity, try to...
Mathematics Vision Project
Module 1: Getting Ready Module
This fabulous resource is a must-have for any algebra teacher's arsenal of lessons. Developing the idea of equations and use of variables from basic physical scenarios, learners gain valuable intuition in the structure and meaning of...
It's About Time
Diversity in Living Things
How diverse is the world we live in compared to the way things used to be? Young biologists explore diverse organisms and relate the structure of each organism to its ability to survive in our current environmental conditions....
Museum of Tolerance
The Price of Personal Responsibility
A reading of Patrick Henry's "Speech in the Virginia Convention," Henry David Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience," and Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail" launch a discussion about the price one is willing to pay to...
Prestwick House
Fahrenheit 451—Activity Pack
The burning questions is at what point do readers of Fahrenheit 451 recognize the many literary devices Ray Bradbury employs in his dystopian classic that warns of a society that uses media to indoctrinate the public and denigrates...
Curated OER
Lesson 1: The Importance of Rules in Our Country and in Our Classroom
Explore the importance of rules in a community with the engaging first lesson plan of this series on the US government. To begin, children play a paper clip game that requires them to make up their own rules as they go, after which the...
EduGAINs
Community Involvement Investigation— Guidance and Career Education
Not only do extracurricular activities look good on a college application, they can foster important life skills. From sports to volunteering to employment, extracurricular activities can inform your learners' experiences later in life....
Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment
Feelings and Emotions
Eighth graders express their emotions with a set of activities about self reflection and feelings. With a set of emotion cards and a worksheet that details negative thought patterns, the resource empowers young learners to discover and...
Safe Drinking Water Foundation
To Filter or Not to Filter
Drinking clean water can be taken for granted. Explore the process and high cost of filtering water with a water pollution and filtration activity. Young scientist build a filtration system to filter polluted water, examine the economics...
Museum of Tolerance
Disenfranchised People of the New Nation
Why are some immigrant groups in the United States embraced while others become disenfranchised? To answer this question, teams investigate why groups emigrated to the US, why some of these these peoples were disenfranchised, and their...
It's About Time
Color Reactions that Involve the Transfer of Electrons
Demonstrate the aging of materials as you assist the class in creating rust. Individuals demonstrate oxidation-reduction reactions that result in the rusting of materials, differentiate between materials that will and will not rust, and...
Virginia Department of Education
The Cycles of Nature
Encourage peer collaboration and assist with the creation of visual aids to identify carbon, water, and nitrogen cycles as your class learns more about nature. They discuss relative information, create a visual aid depicting the chosen...
Chicago Botanic Garden
The Carbon Cycle
There is 30 percent more carbon in the atmosphere today than there was 150 years ago. The first lesson in the four-part series teaches classes about the carbon cycle. Over two to three days, classes make a model of the cycle, add missing...
Blake Education
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone
The motto for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry warns that one should never tickle a sleeping dragon, but learners will definitely be tickled by the activities in a packet of materials designed to accompany a reading of the...
Facing History and Ourselves
Laws and the National Community
When it comes to the law, is justice always served? Teach scholars about how law sometimes enables prejudice of entire groups of people with a unit on World War II that includes a warm-up activity, analysis of primary sources,...
Scholastic
Voyage on the Mayflower
After completing an online activity about the Mayflower, scholars draw a picture about what they know of the Thanksgiving holiday, including a one-sentence summary. A reading of If You Were at the First Thanksgiving by Anne Kamma is the...
Cultures of Dignity
Equity and Equality Lesson
Equality does not equal equity and this lesson explains why. Class members compare two images--one labeled "Equality" and the other "Equity." Using the provided discussion questions, they then develop definitions that distinguish between...
Ideas From Suzi
Guided Reading: Beyond the Basics
Elevate children's reading comprehension skills with this collection of guided reading resources. From paper dice with basic comprehension questions printed on them to a system for using sticky notes to identify key parts of a story,...