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As we have learned throughout our education, every teacher is a teacher of reading. Plus, by integrating science with literature, hopefully, more kids will become excited about science. This website offers literature books specifically related to individual content areas. While the website is directed toward elementary teachers, I think some of the books could be utilized by middle school teachers as well. These may be a fun way to introduce a new topic or just on shelves for students to learn more about a specific topic that interests them.

This is a link to the Missouri Botanical Garden website which makes for a great field trip. At the Missouri Botanical Garden, students explore plants from around the world and go into greenhouses. There is also a Children's Garden geared specifically toward younger students. I selected this resource because I have experience with the Missouri Botanical Garden. Kids really enjoy exploring and learning about the plants. A field trip to the gardens could be used to bolster units involving plant life, photosynthesis, and changing seasons.  I could use this resource at any grade level because the Garden does a good job at having activities for kids of various ages.

This is a downloadable app that provides an interactive, virtual dissection. Not only can students virtually dissect a frog, but they can also learn about the habitat of frogs, the different types, take a quiz, and compare frogs to humans. They will also be taught about the different tools that are used for dissecting and when it is appropriate to use each tool. This app can be used in the classroom in order to dissect frogs without the mess and smell, but still allow the students to learn the necessary information.

This website gives you the ingredients and amounts of different liquids and materials to poor into a clear cylinder to determine the different densities of materials. In their lab groups, the students will determine the order that the materials will layer in the cylinder before the materials are actually poured in. I selected this resource because it provides a way do demonstrate density in the classroom and it explains the reason for why each material settles differently. I would use this experiment as a way to introduce volume and density to my middle school students.

This lab requires students to analyze what they already know about Newton's Laws of Motion. The students will calculate the speed of the balloon as it soars while implementing the scientific method. This is a great resource to get the students up and moving in the classroom, and I would use this lab as a way to incorporate hands on experimentation with Newton's Laws.

To show students the affects of air pressure. Sixth Acquire data through the senses. (3)(B) classify matter and forces, organisms, actions, and events from the environment according to similarities and differences. Show the students a bottle that has a mouth that is too small for an egg to pass through. ______________________ This activity sparked my interest because ever since I was little, I watched a TV sitcom which explored this concept. How can an egg fit into a container with an opening smaller than the egg?! Using heated air at the bottom of the container, the air pressure sucks the egg in. This particular activity attached goes into using a piece of plywood and paper as well to demonstrate the weight of air. One of both of these demonstrations could be used when explaining air pressure to students. This is more of a complex concept, therefore I think this activity would be best suitable for older ages. I would use these demonstrations at the beginning of the unit to make them want to know more!

Electricity -- we depend on it every minute of every day. And yet to many of us, electricity seems a mysterious and even magical force. Before Ben Franklin did his famous and very dangerous kite flying experiment, electricity was thought to be a type of fire. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I think this is an excellent lesson to teach to grades 3-6. I am pleased with this lesson that it lists the lesson sequence, materials needed, and the objectives. I really like the variety that this lesson includes. It allows students to get up and move in acting out an electric circuit as well as get up close and personal with electricity and how it works with the activity. Not only does this lesson involve interactive components for students, it also provides many videos that correlate with the lesson. This lesson plan seems easy to follow with the instructional sequence and I think it would be easy to fit within the McKendree lesson plan template and add a bit of flair from the teacher candidate. I think this lesson also allows teachers to impose his or her own spin on the lesson and choose what parts to include or omit as well as what might need to be added to the lesson. A lesson like this with so much instructional variety helps to reach students that learn from hands-on activities, students who learn more visually, as well as students who learn best from discussion and instruction. I would follow the instructional sequence if I were to use this lesson in the classroom, but I would tailor it to fit my time allotment for teaching Science, thus it would be done in smaller segments. I would choose one or two videos to share with the class, but post the rest on our class website so the children could view them if the wanted to.

The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, IL is filled with many hands on activities for all kinds of science. Why does a tornado spin? Why does a wave break? Why does a flame burn? Why does lightning strike? Our questions about the world begin almost as soon as we're aware of it. I have been to this museum but it has been a long time. After trying to think of an interesting place to go and looking at several, this museum seems to be filled with many hands on science experiences and that is why I chose this museum. Also, for field trips, chaperons and students get into the museum for free but there are small fees for the omnimax and certain special exhibits. I also loved that there were labs you could rent, online resources, and they also include worksheets for activities they do in the museum. For the labs they also include standards on their website, including the next generation standards! Many exhibits interest me but this one on Science Storms would be great to take your students after doing a lesson on weather in science. This would give students an insight to mother nature, it's strength in an up close view. There are so many more to include though. So you could even do an end of the year field trip, or maybe an 8th grade trip and include an educational engaging experience for the children.

Go on an exploration of what we're made of and how we work with this Human Body app, from Tinybop. This app will help students explore the body. I think that using this app in the classroom students will get a better understanding of the human body then just a picture. They will have an interactive experience of exploring the human body. It also shows what different aspects of your body can do, such as seeing sound waves with the ear. I think that the new technology will help students learn more efficiently.

This activity shows how a cloud makes rain. For this activity you fill up a jar most of the way with water. Top the water with shaving cream. Drip food coloring into the shaving cream until eventually it fills up and starts dripping through the shaving cream. I chose this activity because there are a few simple items needed, shaving cream, water, jar, food coloring which could be found around the home and would be interesting for children. This would help simplify the understanding of clouds producing rain for young children. This activity can be used during the studying clouds/weather I would use during the lesson while explaining how clouds make rain for a visual.

This lesson is so simple and adorable! It's about teaching students the types of clouds and precipitation. It gives a very simple and eye friendly teacher outline for the types of clouds and directions for a demonstration. I think this project could be taken down or up a few notches to match the age group someone was teaching. It's a very wonderful lesson for active and visual learners. It provides a bit of hands on involvement and visual demonstrations about rain fall. I would use this lesson to teach to my class as a whole, but I would love to put my student's into groups to do the experiment. I think it would be a good time for them to practice the scientific process that we would've previously discussed, by allowing them to think critically and predict what would happen to the food coloring droplets and so on.

Because observation, prediction, and communication are all very important science skills, this project works perfectly to help students improve in all of those areas! As a teacher, I would use this activity to tie in with telling time and with our Solar System unit. This project would ideally be used in a third grade class and be a good hands on project. I thought that it would be fun to keep a classroom sun dial outside so we could keep a chart about how accurate it worked or even use it as some kind of experiment. I think it's a very unique lesson and project. It's something that you wouldn't see every day in a Science class with that age group.

Remove "science" tag and add something more specific, like "earth science." To keep words together, use " " around the word. For example, remove the tags "sun" and "dial" and add one that is "sun dial". Grade level tags should be k-2, 3-5, 6-8, and/or 9-12 to be consistent among all the resources.

In this activity/lesson students cross off or color bingo squares in response to questions about their traits. By doing so, students will create an inventory of their own traits and compare traits within the class to determine which are the least and most common. I would use this in upper grade level as a beginning activity in genetics. I believe this activity would be fun for students while still being informative and encouraging inquiry and group discussion.

This foldable could be used to help understand the layers of the Earth. There is a template for students to cut and paste onto construction paper. The layers of the Earth are already made so students only need to cut them out and correctly place onto the layer. The foldable comes with step-by-step instruction for students to follow. What a great way for students to visually see the layers of the Earth!

This is a field trip that I took with my high school physics class and i think it could be scaled down and still be useful at the junior high level.

This link is actually more direct to the information relevant for planning a school trip. http://www.sixflags.com/stLouis/groups/schools.aspx

This is an activity to teach students about ocean trenches, how to locate the Marina Trench on a map, identify the depth, length and width of the Trench, and identify the country that has jurisdiction over the Marina Trench. The website also gives you a step-by-step lesson and how to teach the activity. There is vocabulary and additional activities included to use with your students. I could also integrate geography and mapping with this activity. The video is really great because it is an animated fly through that I think students would really enjoy!

This activity is a great introduction or addition to learning about the rock cycle. By using chocolate, you can show students the difference between weathered, heated, cooled, and compressed rock. The students can use bars of chocolate to create "sedimentary," "metamorphic," and "igneous" chocolate. This is a simple way to effectively show students the difference between the types of rock. The hands-on approach will aid in the students seeing firsthand what the differences look like. It aligns with NGSS focused on the rock formation and cycle, as well as, the geosphere.

How sweet is this activity? It's an introduction to the rock cycle using chocolate! Chocolate can be ground into small particles (weathered), heated, cooled, and compressed - just like rocks. Unlike rocks, chocolate can undergo these processes safely and at reasonable temperatures. Use your chocolate to create "sedimentary," "metamorphic," and "igneous" chocolate. I chose this lesson because it is a great way to get the class focused during a not so exciting topic, not to mention chocolate is my favorite thing on the entire world. I think the chocolate creations are perfect representations of the changing rock, and would allow students to understand the rock changing process easily by using visuals. I would introduce this lesson in an earth science unit as a good tool to show the three stages of rock, and to get the class hooked and ready to discuss the different phases. I would also enjoy making these three phases at home because I am sure there would be lots of left overs!

This lessons discusses the four layers of the Earth. This website also shows the ocean floor, oceanic and continental crust, lithosphere, and asthenosphere. It also explains tectonic plates and continental shelves and shapes. I choose this website as a supplemental resource to teach about Earth's systems. This website is easy for students to read and understand. It also provides great images to help students understand these concepts.

This is a fun and creative way to get students thinking about size and shape. This lesson could also be used for osmosis. Students could use different liquids to soak the gummies in overnight and make measurements and predictions about size and shape in a journal. It would be fun to do this lesson, because at the end you get to eat gummy bears!

US Geologic Survey has created an online interactive depiction of the water cycle. When you scroll over the different types of water action in the image, information about that component of the cycle shows up. This would be useful for student exploration of the water cycle or review.