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Book Chapter
This activity is designed to help students understand that light does have a finite speed and that this has consequences for us. In order to grasp the meaning of the activity, it is important for students to understand that light acts as a messenger ...
Book Chapter
Measuring parallax and angular diameters are two indirect methods of measuring size and distance in the solar system. The scale model is another indirect method of measurement that also allows us to explore the relationships between multiple componen...
Book Chapter
The Goldilocks Effect: Earth Is Just Right
Complex life forms require certain conditions to thrive. The distance from a star at which an Earth-like planet could sustain life is known as the habitable zone—not too close, not too far, but just right. This Reading provides background infor...
Book Chapter
The Formation of the Solar System
Over the last four centuries, people have developed many theories to explain the origin and evolution of the solar system. Today, the theory most commonly held by scientists is known as the solar nebula theory. In this activity, students create, obse...
Book Chapter
The stars are too far away to measure their distance directly, so astronomers use an indirect method that involves looking at the star from two or more perspectives. They measure how much the foreground star’s position changes among the background ...
Book Chapter
Habitable Zone: How Distance and Temperature Are Related
Earth is the only planet we know of in the solar system that supports life. In this activity, students will investigate the way distance from a light source affects temperature—one of the many reasons why Earth is “just right” in its ability to...
Book Chapter
Creature Feature: Comparing Earth to Mars and Venus
Mars and Venus are Earth’s closest neighbors. The differences between them are striking. In many ways, Earth can be thought of as the happy medium between the two extremes that Mars and Venus represent. In this activity, students create Martians an...
Book Chapter
Water is such an integral part of human existence that it makes up nearly three-quarters of Earth’s surface and has a profound effect on all life on Earth. Water vapor in the atmosphere accounts for just one-thousandth of 1% of all the water on Ear...
Book Chapter
Measurements and Molecules Matter: Less Is More and Curriculum "Survival of the Fittest"
Many famous scientific discoveries have been made when an experimenter noticed something unusual or a mistake and followed up on the serendipitous discrepancy rather than ignoring it as others had done. This free activity serves as an engaging intro...
Book Chapter
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about characteristics of life. Viruses are used as a context to uncover students’ ideas about what determines whether something is considered a living or a nonliving thing. This sa...
Book Chapter
Distances to stars and galaxies are so great that communicating the measurement in kilometers is cumbersome and difficult to comprehend. So, astronomers use a larger unit of measure called the “light year.” It is the distance that light travels i...
Book Chapter
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about the human excretory system. The probe is designed to see if students recognize that the human excretory system removes metabolic wastes, rather than undigested food or other no...
Book Chapter
This book, and particularly the stories which lie within, provide an opportunity for students to take ownership of their learning and learn science in a way that will give them a more positive attitude about science. In addition, it will serve to hel...
Book Chapter
The story, in this chapter, is meant to show students the importance of leavening agents in making baked goods. Yeast, a living organism (a fungus), is necessary for baking risen yeast breads. This fungus can be ineffective if it is not healthy. The ...
Book Chapter
Springtime in the Greenhouse: Planting Season
Children and adults alike are prone to believe that if a little of something is good, more is better. In the case of this story, your students will probably believe that if fertilizer is good for growing plants, it must be good for germinating seeds....