In this lesson, students record the position of the sun in the morning and afternoon and make connections to the directions east and west. They practice moving north, south, east, and west and use cardinal directions to read a map.
The nose is your body’s instrument for smelling. Tiny pieces of matter are sucked into the nose and identified as smells. Nerve cells then tell your brain what you are smelling.
This resource presents a short slide show about how humans detect and interpret scents. After utilizing this resource, the students can complete the short test to assess their understanding.
Children move an object in front of a flashlight and observe how its shadow changes in this interactive game from PEEP and the Big Wide World. As children slide the object closer to and farther away from the light until its shadow matches the size of the object’s outline on the wall, they discover that when an object is moved closer to the light source, it blocks more light and its shadow becomes larger. Children also explore how changing the position of the light changes the direction in which the shadow of the object falls.
To view the Activity, Student Handout, and Teaching Tips for this interactive game, go to Support Materials. This resource was developed through WGBH’s Bringing the Universe to America’s Classrooms project, in collaboration with NASA.
The many parts of your immune system work together to defend your body against diseases. White blood cells in your blood vessels and lymph vessels help protect your body by killing intruders and getting rid of harmful materials.
This resource presents a short slide show about the human immune system. After utilizing this resource, the students can complete the short test to assess their understanding.
Baby animals have been captured and it is up to the Kratts to use their knowledge of animals and power suits to rescue the creatures. Players will figure out which powersuits are needed to get through the maze.
Students will use Google Drawings to create an infographic describing why an organism is classified as a living thing.
This learning activity was created as a result of the Girls Engaged in Math and Science University, GEMS-U Project.
In this lesson, students will explore animal adaptations for a variety of animals. Students will select one adaptation and create a wanted poster describing the specific adaptation for that animal and how it functions to help the animal survive, grow, behave, or reproduce.
This lesson results from a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and ASTA.
This lesson plan teaches students about lunar phases. Students will manipulate an interactive model of the moon to observe the motion of the moon. They will use the model to observe the motion of the moon and the patterns of lunar phases.
The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. Students will interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity can introduce students to the concept of designing weather-resistant structures, serve as reinforcement after students have already learned this concept, or be used as an assessment at the conclusion of a lesson.
I'm sure you've heard of Isaac Newton and maybe of some of his laws. Like, that thing about "equal and opposite reactions" and such. But what do his laws mean? And how do they help us understand the world around us? In this episode of Crash Course Physics, Dr. Shini talks to us about just that.
Ever wondered how you ended up with your eye color? The answer is all about heredity.
Heredity is the passing of traits, or features, from parents to offspring through genes. Genes, which are found inside cells, are shared from one generation to the next, passing on all kinds of characteristics like eye color, dimples, freckles, and height.
This classroom resource provides a video that describes the process of inherited traits. After utilizing this resource, the students can complete the short test to assess their understanding. This resource can provide background information to students before they construct and use their own models.
Make it Rain! explores student misconceptions about phase changes, weather, and the water cycle, and reveals some of the pitfalls of common representations.
Students will learn that some art has a purpose other than being art. Many common everyday items can be considered art based on the manner in which they are designed. Students will make a glass dish, using previous instruction on design and learn the basics of glass fusing. During the lesson, students will also learn the need to practice safe working practices so as not to place themselves or others in danger. Lastly, students will learn about the transference of energy or heat in objects and how that energy can impact their final form.
This activity was created as a result of the Arts COS Resource Development Summit.
The lesson provides an overview of cloud formation. Cloud formation results when warm, humid air rises and cools, causing the water vapor in the air to condense and form clouds. In this lesson, students will conduct an activity that demonstrates how this occurs.
This lesson results from a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and ASTA.
This lesson was modified from NASA series “Investigating the Climate System. They can be freely downloaded at https://www.strategies.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Clouds_04.pdf
The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. The students and teacher can interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity can be used as an introduction to sound waves, serve as reinforcement after students have already learned this concept, or be used as an assessment at the conclusion of a lesson. This informational text could provide background knowledge before students perform an experiment using a guitar.
Have you ever wondered why we wear clothes? I mean, beyond the obvious. Why does wearing a jacket in the cold keep you warmer? What is happening to all the heat inside your body? In this episode of Crash Course Physics, Dr. Shini talks about the physics of heat.
The lithosphere is all of the rock on earth, and the hydrosphere is all of the water on earth. The last one is the atmosphere: the layers of gas surrounding the earth.
This resource presents a short slideshow about the different "spheres" of Earth and how they interact to support life. After utilizing this resource, the students can complete the short test to assess their understanding.
In these Hero Elementary activities, children learn about different materials that make up the world around them. They observe and describe the properties of the materials. They compare how materials are alike and different. They sort materials into groups based on their properties. What children learn about the properties of solids and liquids can help them make sense of their world.
In this learning activity, students will gather evidence that spiderwebs transmit vibrations. Students will investigate how a spider reacts to vibrations in its web using a tuning fork. Finally, students will construct their own spider web out of yarn to show the relationship between the vibrations on the web and the spider's reaction to its prey.
This activity results from the ALEX Resource Gap Project.
This lesson deals with human growth and our consumption of land resources. This lesson can be used in conjunction with other Are We Our Own Worst Enemy? lessons, although this should be first since it has the video of population growth.
This lesson results from a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and ASTA.
The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. The students and teacher can interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity can be used to introduce students to the growth needs of plants, serve as reinforcement after students have already learned this concept, or be used as an assessment at the conclusion of a lesson. This learning activity will provide important background information before students plan and carry out their own investigation of growing plants. This resource also provides an eBook of the article with corresponding illustrations.
Sunlight, moonlight, torchlight, and flashlight all come from different places, but they’re the very same thing: light. It’s what makes it possible for us to see the world around us, so it’s worth a close, hard look. For instance, how does light travel? When you flip that switch in the bathroom to brush your teeth, how does light move from the light bulb, to the mirror, and into your eyes? This video explores the ray model, reflection and refraction, diverging and converging lenses, and ray diagrams.
Learn about different water bodies and the various characteristics that make them distinct from one another in this multimedia gallery from WGBH. Water bodies are natural accumulations of water that makeup about three-quarters of Earth’s surface. Each one looks different when viewed from the ground (ground view) and from above (aerial view). Students can use the media in this gallery to explore, identify, and describe characteristics of various water bodies and to compare near-ground-level and aerial views of water bodies.
In this lesson, students observe chemical reactions that produce obvious effects (as opposed to reactions in which the substances appear not to change at all). They begin by exploring a different substance every day for one week. They compare the substances and learn that substances can be solids, liquids, or gases. Next, through teacher demonstration (or direct, supervised student involvement), students watch what happens when sand and water are mixed together (no chemical reaction), and when several pairs of acids and bases are mixed together (a chemical reaction occurs). Students then get to build their own "film canister rockets," using baking soda and vinegar as rocket fuel. This lesson concludes with open-ended thinking when students are asked to determine where rust comes from.
This activity introduces balancing chemical equations through a YouTube video, and then students will model balancing chemical equations.
This activity is a result of the ALEX Resource Development Summit.
First, students will view an engaging video about the recent arrival of the New Horizons spacecraft at Pluto. Students will create a sketch of the solar system to show their current understanding of the relative sizes and distances of the objects in our solar system. Students will then scale the diameters of the Sun, eight main planets, and Pluto, as well as the planets' distances from the Sun. Students will be required to utilize mathematical skills, such as division, rounding, and metric system conversions. After scaling the diameters and orbits of the objects in our solar system, students will create a scaled model of the solar system using a roll of toilet paper.
This lesson results from a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and ASTA.
The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. The students and teacher can interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity can be used to provide information regarding geologic events that happen over a long period of time, serve as reinforcement after students have already learned this concept, or be used as an assessment at the conclusion of a lesson. This activity could provide background information to students before they create models to identify physical features of Earth, such as mountain ranges.
Learning to talk about chemistry can be like learning a foreign language, but Hank is here to help with some straightforward and simple rules to help you learn to speak Chemistrian like a native. In this video, Hank discusses determining and writing formulas, the names of monatomic ions, finding elements on the periodic table, and naming acids and their anions.
As the Earth rotates, light from the sun hits different parts, giving us day and night. During its orbit, the Earth’s tilt on its axis also causes the two hemispheres to be different distances from the sun, and that gives us seasons.
The classroom resource provides a video that will describe how Earth's rotation and revolution cause day and night and seasonal cycles. This resource can provide background information for students before they create their own models. There is also a short test that can be used to assess students' understanding.
In this lesson, students will develop an understanding that whether and how much a substance dissolves (solubility) is a property of that substance. Students will be able to plan and carry out an investigation to compare the solubility of two substances.
Students develop a test to compare how the candy coating from an M&M and a Skittle dissolve in water. Students put an M&M and a Skittle in the same amount of water at the same temperature at the same time. Students will also see that the inside of the Skittles dissolves but the inside of the M&M does not. Students see an animation to help explain why the inside of the Skittles dissolves but the inside of the M&M does not.
This learning activity should be used during a lesson on chemical and physical reactions. The students will observe and analyze the characteristic properties of vinegar and baking soda. They will also conduct an experiment and determine if a chemical reaction has occurred.
This activity was created as a result of the ALEX Resource Development Summit.
The students will work together to design a magnetic system that can float from one point to another. The students will design a graphic organizer showing the sequence and steps needed to design a Maglev Train system by applying a scientific understanding of the forces between interacting magnets.
This lesson results from a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and ASTA.
The classroom resource provides a video that will describe the interactions between organisms in a food web. There is also a short test that can be used to assess students' understanding. Students can use the information presented in this video to create their own model that shows the transfer of matter between organisms.
In this episode of Crash Course Chemistry, Hank goes over the ideas of keeping your life balance, your chemical life. Equilibrium is all about balance and today Hank discusses chemical equilibrium, concentration, temperature, and pressure. Also, he'll chat about Le Chatalier's Principle and Fritz Haber.
Physical changes mean matter changes size or shape, not its atomic makeup. Chemical and nuclear changes alter matter on an atomic level.
The classroom resource provides a video that will explain the difference between physical and chemical changes of matter. This resource can provide background information for students before they conduct their own investigations. There is also a short test that can be used to assess students' understanding.
