JoinAll Resources
Journal Article
Teaching Through Trade Books: A Season to Inquire
Aside from learning about naturally occurring cycles that happen over time, trade books about seasons can help students learn about the cause of the seasons. The activities based on this month’s books deepen students' conceptual understanding of se...
Journal Article
Technology and Society: Their Impact on Each Other
As part of the National Science Foundation–funded Internships in Public Science Education (IPSE) program, the authors created a classroom activity that encourages middle school students to think about the interactions between technology, individual...
Journal Article
The Case Study: Racism and All Sorts of Politically Correct <em> isms </em> in Case Studies
Case studies typically do not promulgate a particular viewpoint about a subject. They may, however, take a particular stance on an issue—one the author does not necessarily personally support or believe in—to challenge students to examine a diffi...
Journal Article
Science 101: What Is Acid Rain?
Acid rain is the collective term for any type of acidified precipitation: rain, snow, sleet, and hail, as well as the presence of acidifying gases, particules, cloud water, and fog in the atmosphere. This section gives a brief description of the sci...
Journal Article
In many schools, students who fail all of their classes are passed to the next grade if the students’ parents or guardians want them to be passed. The justification for this policy is that failing a student would hurt the students’ feelings and d...
Journal Article
Methods and Strategies: The 6-E Learning Model
Most teachers are familiar with the 5-E model of science instruction—Engage, Explore, Explain, Expand, and Evaluate. This model adds a sixth "E" to the tool: "e-search." E-search encompasses any use of electronic media that provides students the op...
Journal Article
A newly appointed joint hire in the College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Natural Sciences and the College of Education, Department of Middle/Secondary Education, was charged with the responsibility of bridging the communication gap between the...
Journal Article
Teaching the Stories of Scientists and their Discoveries
It takes very little extra time and effort to correlate required science concepts with history. For example, teachers can provide the historical background for Mendeleev’s development of the periodic table as students learn the concept of periodici...
Journal Article
Revising Instruction to Teach Nature of Science
Despite numerous attempts, including the major curricular reform efforts of the 1960s to improve students’ understandings about the scientific endeavor, students have consistently been shown to possess inadequate understandings of several aspects o...
Journal Article
Mountains Majesty: Ecosystems of the Rocky Mountains
Traveling from the East, one can see the towering snow-covered peaks of the Rocky Mountains long before reaching foothills. But to fully appreciate these mountains, one must venture into them and experience up close the colorful bursts of summer wil...
Journal Article
A high school hockey team is playing the last of three games in one day. The game gets rough, and the star player is slammed against the boards. Injured, he is escorted off the ice. This case follows his health as it deteriorates over the next severa...
Journal Article
Scope on the Skies: Sun and Moon upstage each other in October
This issue of Scope on the Skies sheds light on the partial lunar eclipse and the total lunar eclipse that occurred within two weeks of each other during the month of October, 2004. In addition, it describes the sequence of events that ensue during a...
Journal Article
After learning about weathering and erosion, fifth-grade students worked in cooperative groups to create a “mountain” that could resist the effects of water erosion and demonstrate their understanding of the subject....
Journal Article
Tried and True: A touch of neuroscience
The preteen years of the middle grades represent a time of incredible physical and mental development. Understanding the parts and functions of the brain and the nervous system gives middle grade students the opportunity to explore and understand the...
Journal Article
The Case of the “Tainted” Taco Shells
This case study introduces students to the use of genetically modified foods. Students learn how genetically modified plants are made, and then they read primary literature papers to evaluate the environmental, economic, and health issues....
Journal Article
This case involves a couple deciding whether or not their son should undergo brain surgery to treat a severe seizure disorder. In examining this dilemma, students apply knowledge of brain anatomy and function. They also learn about brain scanning tec...
Journal Article
The Biology of Food course—a large lecture course with no laboratory section—is a mixture of kitchen chemistry, post-eating food metabolism, origins of different foods (from crop breeding to evolution), and ecological and environmental impacts of...
Journal Article
The experts address the following question in this month’s column: My mom always warns me that I should never eat undercooked hamburgers, but we serve our grilled steaks medium rare. Isn’t that dangerous too? And what about other meats such as po...
Journal Article
Coins represent much more than a token of monetary value. They tell a story. Nearly every Roman ruler issued many coins of various sizes that reflected the confidence, stability, and standardization of his reign, and the inscriptions reflected the ho...
Journal Article
This fun, hands-on activity helps students learn about the layers of the Earth's interior. After some background information about the structure of the Earth, students cover balloons with papier-mâché. After the "globes" dry, students cut out wedge...
Journal Article
Science 101: Are Bats Dangerous?
Bats are fascinating and beneficial animals, but students often have many misconceptions and fears about them. This introduction to bats will provide teachers with the information they need to help students learn more about these night flyers....
Journal Article
In this interrupted case, students read about the alarm-calling behavior of a certain type of ground squirrel and then work in groups to develop hypotheses to explain the behavior and describe data that might be used to test their hypotheses. Student...
Journal Article
This article describes a paleontological dig created for third- and fourth-grade students. The purpose of the activity was to have students experience firsthand the process of developing hypotheses about the history of our planet based on the evidenc...
Journal Article
Take a Bite Out of Teenage Cavities!
A dental hygiene forum was designed for middle level students in order to reinforce their knowledge of oral hygiene, broaden their understanding of oral anatomy, and teach them about common oral diseases. A variety of methods were used to capture and...
Journal Article
To teach students about food safety practices, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) formed a partnership to develop a free curriculum kit titled Science and Our Food Supply (FDA and NSTA 2...
Journal Article
Getting More Mileage Out of Mousetrap Cars
Building and racing mousetrap cars is a common activity in many eighth- and ninth-grade physical science classrooms. However, once students have raced their cars, most mousetrap assignments come to an end. The project described here was developed to ...
Journal Article
Teaching Through Trade Books: Fascinating Fossil Finds
This month’s Teaching Through Trade Books column engages students in “unearthing” fossils and exploring the processes scientists use in uncovering these fascinating finds and interpreting Earth’s past. ...
Journal Article
A Voyage through the Radio Universe
The Radio Astronomy Research Team from from Oil City Area Senior High School (OCHS) in Oil City, Pennsylvania, embarked on a special project titled “Mapping the Universe” at the start of the 2000 school year. For the project, students analyzed da...