Group items tagged

In this activity, students are put into small groups to construct 3D candy landform maps. To begin, students are given a blank outline of the United States on a large piece of paper and a landform map. Students must then map out where all of the major rivers, deserts, mountain ranges, plains, and oceans are. Next, students are given various candy, yarn, and paint with which to construct their map and key. I chose this activity for three main reasons. For one, it allows students to work with their peers to create a product. It also provides them with a link between social studies and science. Finally, students are very likely to be engaged in the project because both candy and painting are involved. I could see myself using this project in my classroom as a conclusion to a unit on landforms because it is a culmination of many different types of landforms as well as an application of what has been studied to an actual map of the United States, thus making a real-world connection.

"Two similar plants are observed as one gets regular water and the other does not." This science lesson and activity can benefit students in so many ways. Students will be observing and making comparisons among two plants as one plant receives water and the other does not. Throughout this week-long project, the students will be coming up with their own theories about what will happen to each of these plants. Along with this, they will be comparing and contrasting their observations and the final results. I believe that students would love an activity like this, and it would be extremely beneficial to them as they learn how living things change and depend on their environment to satisfy their basic needs.

This would be a good activity for younger students to explore magnets. I think this project because the students get to explore and discover things on their own. They get to try different objects and figure out what works and what does and the similarities in the objects.

This is an interactive games that challenges students to think about how weightlessness would affect the way Earth-based games would be played in space. i chose this source because I liked the idea of playing a game in the classroom, and this seemed like a really fun and educational game to try. I imagine this game will be played in the classroom.

This PDF is a couple pages of items. The students has to think about when items can be reduced, reused, or recycled and which ones can't It will get the students to realize what is good for the environment and what hurts it.

This website includes: lesson plan, worksheets, higher-level thinking and reasoning questions for students. It has four weeks of activities to better understand the solar system and the entire universe and what it is made of. The four weeks are sections off into groups: Universe, Solar System, Earth and Geography. This website list all materials needed, the background information needed, higher-level thinking questions asked to students, diagrams and visual on each subject matter. There is a lab that gets the students working together and reasoning through their connections and answers. I would use this in my third grade classroom to help the students reason on why the planets rotate like they do, and other higher-level thinking questions. This will help the students reason, think on higher-levels of questions not just in science but in all subject areas.

Great find!

The Field Museum is a science centered museum located in Chicago, IL. This specific tour allows students to investigate how DNA analysis has changed our understanding of the relatedness of life on Earth through hands on activities. The students will be able to extract DNA in a lab and interview scientists. This field trip supports NGSS MS-LS4-2. I chose this location for a field trip because it engages students' learning and furthers their knowledge of DNA through hands on activity. I would take the students to participate in this DNA extraction after we finished our lesson on DNA. This way, they would be able to be even further engaged with questioning and answering with the scientists and apply our textbook knowledge to the activity.

The Children's University of Manchester produces this page. It is absolutely fabulous! The website is interactive, teaching students about a variety of different subjects in a way that is appealing to children. The brief lesson could be used as a quick introduction to a topic, or a quick recap over a topic. The site I have linked to is about the phases of the moon. The children can see a short animated clip showing the sun with the earth and moon orbiting around it. The clip has facts throughout, and a brief quiz at the end. I would highly recommend incorporating this site into your classroom!

This multimedia learning app teaches children about the water cycle. This app allows children to both learn about the water cycle, and test their knowledge. For each stage of the water cycle, the children learn about the process, fun facts about the stage, as well as how it can be seen in nature. Ie.: "Precipitation can be rain, snow, hail, etc." This app was the awarded the 2014 American Association of School Librarians Best Apps for Teaching & Learning in the STEM Category.

This interactive map of the world allows for so much exploration! Click anywhere on the map and it will give you the climate, landforms, rock types, and even land cover for the particular area. I find this resource to be very helpful especially when comparing biomes. Teachers could easily come up with activities to use the map. For example you could have students compare and contrast 5 different countries based on their climate, landforms, rock type, and land cover. Then have students make predictions about what would live in that area or what would even grow there. Overall I think that teachers could use this map many ways in the classroom and I think students would find it very interesting.

In this lesson you go over 6 different habitats in the world. The list contains grasslands (or savanna), temperate forest, tropical rain forest, desert, polar ice, tidepools. You separate your class into six groups and assign each group a habitat. Each habitat has its own assigned question that the students need to find the answer to through research of their habitat using a computer. For example the grassland group has to explain why speed is such a good thing for animals who live there, while the temperate forests are going to explain what tree leaves have to do with frozen water available in their climate. When the assignment is done students have to present their work to the class and teach each other what they learned through their own research. The lesson is basically about adaptations and how they come in handy in certain parts of the world but not others. This link also has web links embedded in it to help students look for their answers. I think this is great for a unit on adaptations and habitats. I would have loved to do this in my upper elementary classes. i feel like i would have learned and remembered so much more. It definitely fosters more constructive learning. I don't tell you about adaptations and then ask questions, you are sent to find the info on your own.

This is a K-2 lesson comparing the qualities of rocks which I think is a great activity for that age group. The students are to compare different groups of rocks, noting their qualitative differences. We all probably did something similar when we were this age, and it remains a quality sensory activity for the students. The lesson is fully laid out in what is essentially a lesson plan, and it was written by a teacher. I highly recommend giving it a look.

In this game, students are separated into teams. Each team is given a block of Legos. Students must then take turns crab-walking from one side of the room to the other. Once the student reaches the other side, they are to break off one Lego from their block, set it on the floor, then pass the remaining piece to the next classmate in line. This game is a fun and easy way of explaining the process of the weathering away of a rock through the effects of erosion and deposition. I chose this resource because I thought it was a great way for students to become actively involved in the process of erosion, while allowing them to be active and work with their classmates. I would use this game in my classroom as a conclusion to a lesson on weathering, erosion, and deposition.

This is the webpage for Mrs. Sharp's 4th Grade classroom at Friendsville Elementary School. This activity is similar to a field trip because the students get to leave the classroom and investigate, but they do not actually leave the school grounds. The students get to go outside and walk around their school to find signs of erosion. They will keep a notebook with them to record their findings. I chose this activity because it is a fun interactive way for students to learn. They get to get out of their seats and learn through a hands on activity. I would use this activity to wrap up the erosion unit and to show students that erosion is everywhere. We would end the activity by coming back into the classroom and discussing the findings.

This page contains a few worksheets and a powerpoint. There are also printable pictures and text. All of these can be used to help supplement a lesson on the water cycle.

This is a well rounded lesson plan that utilizes online resources as well as in class activities. This serves as a good introduction to the unit and gets the students to be creative. It also hits on multiple styles of learning.

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.

This is a great source for showing students chain reactions and to as how the environment is affect by our decisions. I feel like this could be used with younger students but also with a bit older students as a reminder for earth day.

This is a lesson plan that helps teach the water cycle. It has the students acting as water droplets and moving through different stations in the room to represent them moving through the different stages in the water cycle. I like that in this lesson it gets the students out of their seats.