Resources for Teaching Science

Early learners are sure to love these introductory videos on the concept of the solar system. This series features high quality music and animation that will instantly engage kids, and which teachers will enjoy watching as well. Each video states facts about its subject in a catchy song to aid kids in retaining the information and exciting them to discover more. _____________________________________________________________________ I love these videos! This website provides many Storybots videos that all relate to the solar system. These videos are fun to watch and get students engaged. They provide information on everything in the solar system (planets, sun, Earth, stars). Each video provides a catchy song that draws students in, while also teaching them different things about the solar system. I chose this resource because I personally love all the videos. I think they provide a lot of information on the solar system, but in a fun way. I think students will really enjoy these videos, and I think they'll also learn a lot as well. I watched the sun video a couple times and I was already beginning to learn some of the lyrics! I think this resource could be used as a hook for any lesson about the solar system. These videos could be used as an introduction and will help get the students engaged in the material. Students will want to learn more once they watch these videos!

Learn More & Get Involved The Lower River Cam, located in Katmai National Park and Brooks Camp, Alaska, is where the Brooks River meets Naknek Lake. It is a favorite place of mothers and their young cubs, females and young adults until September when as many as 100 bears descend on the area to feast over a two month period. ______________________________________________________________________________ This is a GREAT website! This website allows viewers to observe animals in their natural habitats (my favorite are the elephants). Some of the animals include elephants, bears, sharks, penguins, and many more. These animals are found everywhere around the world, and cameras are put in their habitats (both in zoos and in the wild) so viewers can observe the way these animals act in their natural habitats. I chose this resource simply because I absolutely love it. I've heard nothing but good things about this website. My brother has used this website in his kindergarten classroom and his students really enjoyed observing the different animals. I also like how the website provides a wide range of animals, which helps peak every students' interest. This resource could be used during any science lesson about animals. If students are learning about animals and their habitats, this website would be very resourceful and would be a great visual to show the different habitats animals live in. Overall, I think this resource gets students interested in animals and can be used at any grade level to peak students' interest.

In this activity you need a flashlight, A transparent container with flat parallel sides, and 250 milliliters (1 cup) of milk. There will be water in the container. Gradually as you experiment you will add more milk to the water. The water acts as the day time sky, the milk acts as the clouds, and the flashlight is the sun. As you add more milk it gives of the appearance of a more cloudy sky. The cloudier you make it the more orange the light will get. Basically the sun sets as you fill the container with more and more milk. I think this is an awesome idea. I have never seen this done before but I would have been amassed as a student to see this. it fits great with a weather lesson, a light lesson, or a lesson about clouds and cloud types. Depending on have advanced your students are you could probably ask them to give you examples of the cloud cover that might be present as you continue to pour in the milk. This is another good observation and journal point in class. Maybe you don't tell them right away what it is supposed to look like and you have them tell you instead. You could discuss how as clouds get thicker less light passes through and introduce terms such as transparent and translucent. Whether you tell them what it is or not it is a great connection to make with students. This is something that literally happens every day in their own lives. maybe you could have them go home with journals and compare the real sunset to the one you made in class today.

This link allows students to either move the moon around the earth and see the phases, or they can click what phase they want to see and the moon jumps to the position it would be in when in the sky. Bellow the big picture you can also advance the moons position around the earth day by day. Using this simulator may dispel so misunderstandings about what causes the phases of the moon. There are several different views of the same information so students can choose which ever one makes more sense to them to look at. As I also said above there are several different ways to manipulate whats in front of you. I would most definitely use this in a chapter about the moon. I might have a worksheet that asks students to show me where the moon would be at each phase, I might follow that with questions about why they think the moon looks the way it does. I love this tool, it was introduced to me in astronomy. I love how easy it is to use. Again you can manipulate it day by day, you get to see what the moon would really look like up in the sky if you had the chance to see it, and you get to see and understand what rotates around what.( We rotate around the sun, the moon rotates around us.)

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 an android app, there is a free trial but then you do have to pay about $3 for the rest of the experiments. The app opens with an experiment using batteries, tape, paper, two alligator clips, and a pencil led. The isea is to build a simple circuit. The whole experiment is guided on what ever device you use. After the experiment is conducted it is even explained. The guide even tells you why pencil led was used, graphite contains carbon and carbon can carry electricity. I would use this app in a young classroom to introduce electricity, or the flow of energy. I might even use this as an opener so everyone can do it. Then we might discuss what exactly we learned, or what else we would like to know. I would also set up at least one real experiment to show the students up close. I wouldn't let them do a real one on their own unless they were 3rd grade and up. I think this is an amassing way to introduce electricity and show students how circuits work. Electricity is a real world thing that they use every day.

This is a lesson that teaches kids about the phases of the moon by using Oreos. It's originally for Kindergarten students according to the website that I found it on, however, one of my college professors used this activity in my Physical Science class and it's still the reason how I know the moon phases. I would definitely use this in my classroom at any grade level because no matter how old you are, Oreos are always a great tool for learning! I could see myself using this in my classroom after a presentation of this unit and after they are introduced to other pictures, I would set up stations or something for them to identify what moon they're trying to make, and then replicate that with their Oreo. This was one of my favorite activities as a young adult, so I'm sure any student and any age could really learn a lot with this as well as having fun with science! Who knows, maybe one little Oreo activity could birth the passion of a future astronomer in my classroom!

This process is called 'capillary action'. In this experiment you will need a little bit of time. You need a minimum of two glasses, one filled with water and the other one empty. You then will twist a paper towel and form a 'rope' out of it. You will place this in the glass with water in it. You will also place the other end of it in the empty glass. If you do this in the morning first thing when the students get there you could check on it at lunch and maybe a gain before you leave for the day, either way this takes time. You cant start this right before science. What happens is the water travels up one side of the paper towel, across the cups, and down into the other cup until both glasses are evenly filled. This shows students how water is capable of travel. It also is a bridge into talking about how root systems work in plants. What the students will be able to observe throughout the day is the same process plants use when they take water from the soil and carry it to the other parts of the plant. I would do this as an all day thing. Maybe between every subject, or every other subject, I would have them record observations in their journal. This is great for observational skills. You can even use more cups and put food coloring in them, this helps you track the water as it goes from cup to cup.

This activity shows how water is absorbed by plants. By placing a white carnation with stem into a tube or cup of colored water, the plant absorbs the water, changing the carnation the color of the water that was absorbed. I chose this activity because I feel like it would be a great way for children to see and understand what would be taught when learning about plants. I would introduce the lesson by explaining that plants need water. We would discuss where the children believe the water goes in the plant and I would let the children discuss what they think "might" happen. This would allow group discussion, the children would be making hypothesis, and applying knowledge all while introducing this lesson. I would explain that we will let the plants sit in the water throughout the week for the lesson. We could document daily results in a journal and then at the end discuss what we have learned and how it was different or the same then what we believed at the beginning.

This science experiment is a creative and fun way to show students how water moves through plants. Rain absorbs into the ground, then moves up the roots, through the flower, and to the pedals. What I love about using the food coloring, is it provides more of a clear picture of how the water moves through the flowers. By using the food coloring, the students can also note the time it takes for the water to hydrate the flower. I would use this in the classroom for the students to journal their own hypothesis or draw where the food coloring would be visible at. If I did this experiment before teaching the lesson, I would ask my kids to think about if the colored water would actually be visible or if we wouldn't have been able to tell a difference. This would be a quick and simple thing to demonstrate and discuss to help my students build ideas on their own, think reasonably, and even practice using the scientific method.

This experiment uses a plastic bag, string, scissors and a small action figure. As you might have guested you are going to make a parachute. After you construct the parachute you will drop it as slow as you can. This shows air resistance. This is a great start to a lesson, an experiment, and even an example of a fair test! I would use this to start a lesson on air resistance ( or maybe even gravity). I would first drop my parachute in the class and ask students what happened. I might even drop both an action figure by himself, and an action figure on a parachute to farther demonstrate the air resistance. I might ask questions such as "why did this action figure fall more slowly? What was stopping him? Why/how? Then after a discussion I would get out materials for the whole class. I would ask students "What could we test using what we now know to create different parachutes and find out which one will work the best?" We would talk about how larger surface area creates more resistance and will make a parachute fall more slowly. In the aspects of a fair test I would try to guide the idea towards testing out maybe 5 different parachutes. The controlled aspect would be using the same material, and same size parachute. What would change would be how many holes we would put in the top of it. Holes in the top cause air to go through the parachute not around it, this causes the parachute to fall more straight. (This is something we might have found out through research.) The goal would be to make a parachute that falls as slow and straight as possible. The challenge would be where to place the holes and how big the holes should be.

When you drop an egg in a glass of plain water it sinks. If you drop the same egg in a glass of salt water, it floats. This experiment link explains this. If you start class with the two glasses and the eggs and just have students make observations you could really spark some interesting conversations. I would use this in part of a density lesson. This might even be my introduction to density. It is definitely a way to grab the students attention because you almost play a mind trick on them. As a student I know this would have really captured my interest, it also sparks more exploration. What else could you add to water to get the same results?

In this lesson, you are asking the students to compare the ways in which animals move: which body parts they use, how quickly, etc. The students then compare as a class and in small groups. The lesson asks you to take them outside or to bring animals into your classroom to observe them, but that is not necessarily an option, so I would alter the lesson by pulling up videos of animals for them. If multiple computers are available, one could have a different animal video going at different spots around the room for the different groups to go to. This lesson could be very fun for the students. I really think they'd enjoy actually seeing the animals move as opposed to simply talking about it.

This interactive map could be a useful tool when teaching about animal species and how they differentiate around the world. The interactive map shows the different kinds of bears that live around the world, and where bears do not live. This map can be pulled up on the projector for the entire class, or on an individual computer to allow the students to explore the map themselves. I think I would put it on an individual computer as part of a center in a bigger lesson about how species differentiate as you move around the world. I think students would have fun with this program.

Students will conduct a series of experiments in pairs through which they will explore the processes and effects of weathering and erosion. Using the results from these explorations, they will design and conduct an experiment comparing the rate of erosion in different biomes. This activity not only allows students to learn about weathering and erosion, but also illustrates how scientists often use the results of one experiment to inspire another and/or use initial observations to inform a hypothesis. I think that students would enjoy this quality lesson.

On 27 August 1883, the Earth let out a noise louder than any it has made since. It was 10:02 AM local time when the sound emerged from the island of Krakatoa, which sits between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. Wow! This video is crazy awesome! On the website there is a video posted of a volcano in Indonesia erupting. It shows the volcano erupting and then you hear this unexpected BOOM (they call it a shock in the video)! After that all you see is thick gray smoke covering the volcano. This video would be a great resource to incorporate into any lesson over volcanoes erupting, it is a great realistic feature. Before showing the video to students you could make them record what predictions about what they think will happen when the volcano erupts, and then show them the video and discuss what actually happens. Another great feature about this website is that it gives information about the volcano erupting and what were some of the effects from the eruption. It also explains what happened when the volcano made that BOOM noise. Overall I thinks students will love watching a real life volcano erupt, they will most likely think its pretty awesome!

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.

You've now reached the outer edges of our own solar system It would take you about 23 million years of continuous scrolling on this scale to get to the farthest regions of the observable universe, another 435,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kmor 46 billion light years away. We think we'll stop here. Hands down this is one of the most engaging sites I've ever visited. It is jam packed with fun facts, information, and references about outer space! I find it totally awesome how they created the site to be like a virtual rocket ride through space. You literally scroll the rocket down to get to different regions of space, along the way you get facts about the atmosphere, planets, meteors, and so much more! This site is so engaging that I thinks students will fall in love with it! It is whimsical and very colorful! Teachers could easily incorporate this site when teaching about the solar system. You could have students go on the site and find 5 facts that they found most interesting and have them share with the class. Or as a class you could scroll through space and learn about so many things! I think this site is just fascinating and could be very valuable, especially since there is so much information on space it makes for a great timeline/distance line since it can get confusing! I think every teacher should use this website because its awesome and very engaging and I think students will find it captivating.

Giant deadly hornets, gorgeous fluttering butterflies and stealthy crawling stink bugs: readers cannot tear their eyes away from these fascinating creatures. They can discover these and more mesmerizing world insects in Expedition: Insects, an e-book written, illustrated and animated by the Smithsonian Science Education Center. Read now! This app is so cool! The weather lab allows for students to come up with possible outcomes for weather in North America. It is a very interactive, fun, and realistic app. First students pick a an ocean current, air mass 1, and then air mass 2. After, the students are asked what they should wear or what they should be preparing for with the weather situation they just created. Ex. would be, If I live along the East Coast of the US I should... and then they would pick from the options given. This app would be awesome to incorporate when learning about weather. It allows for students to create different weather situations and then also they have to predict what will happen with the situation. I think it would be a great opportunity to have student collaborate with peers and come up with 3-5 weather situations and they should record the weather they created, what they predict will happen, and what actually happened with the weather. I think students would really enjoy this app in the classroom considering its not your typical weather game or activity.

The water cycle describes how Earth's water is not only always changing forms, between liquid (rain), solid (ice), and gas (vapor), but also moving on, above, and in the Earth. This process is always happening everywhere. Back to the water cycle diagram for students. This website can be very functional when teaching about the water cycle. It has a great diagram with clear illustration, words, and even descriptions for a beginner, intermediate, and advance levels. The diagram itself is kind of whimsical and I think the young grades will really be engaged. It also offers detailed descriptions of the different parts of the water cycle in the side bar. This resource would be very valuable when explaining the water cycle. I think teachers could incorporate the diagram during a lesson. Also, they could do informal assessments on the students by having students come up to the smart board and pointing out certain parts of the cycle. Or it could even be a guide for students when they draw their own water cycle for their notes or for a project. Overall, the diagram and the extra explanations over the water cycle can really be helpful in the classroom.

Move objects with your mind, become invisible, play games with a robot and experience augmented reality! Science Fiction, Science Future brings the science of the future into the present, sending visitors on a unique journey filled with science exploration, curiosity and discovery. I hope that one day I would be able to take my class to the U.S. Space and Rocket Center. Currently they are hosting the event Science Fiction, Science Fun. This event looks awesome! From hands-on experiments and activities, to mind control, and even robots, the students will have an unforgettable experience. The field trip would tap into the students curiosities and would leave them amazed! The main reason for the field trip would be for the students to be introduced to new things that we couldn't teach in the classroom, such as holographs and invisibility. Hopefully after the trip more students would be engaged in science class!!