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This activity is an exciting and highly interactive opportunity for students to exercise their creativity and design skills. Working in cooperative groups, students are challenged to explore the geometry of tower design…
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Designing and Constructing a Load-Bearing Structure
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We rely on many structures to bear loads. Examples such as bridges, chairs, shelves, tall buildings, and even our own legs must support weight consistently and effectively. But where do the human-designed examples come…
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Investigating the Pinhole Camera and Camera Obscura
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In this activity, students explore the nature of light, including the fact that it travels in straight lines, by building and using two visual tools. The first is a simple pinhole camera—a box with a pinhole opening.…
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Recording Images Using a Simple Pinhole Camera
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In this lesson, students develop and expand their observational skills and technological understanding by building and operating a pinhole camera. The interdisciplinary connections are in the realm of application in…
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We see, use, and enjoy levers daily—in the operation of pliers, the action of a seesaw, or the beauty of an Alexander Calder mobile. In fact, parts of the human body are levers; think of the knee, elbow, and other…
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This activity involves an exploration of density. Why does oil float on water? How does drain cleaner sink down into the clogged pipe right through standing water? These questions will be answered as students make a…
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Scale is one of the big ideas that cross the science domains. Whether one is talking about the weight of a blue whale, the size of a galaxy or a molecule, or the age of a mountain range, scale is an essential tool in…
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The study of science at the extremes of size often involves creating and testing models of science phenomena. Scientists and engineers often build models at different sizes and scales. These models can be physical, such…
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Your World or Mine? Different Perspectives
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Is the glass half-empty or half-full? That depends on your perspective. Differences in vantage point or prior knowledge can lead to different interpretations or conclusions. Scientists also have various perspectives on…
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Eye in the Sky: An Introduction to GIS & Scale
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New computer technologies allow us to examine scientific data at a variety of different scales from global to local. In this investigation students use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) as a tool to investigate…
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Drops to the Ocean: A GIS Study of River Basins
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Water is a critical element of life. It plays a crucial role at many scales from singles cells to huge river systems. In this investigation, students explore local, regional, and global river basins using GIS as a tool…
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As science extends into the very large and the very small ends of the scale, the images of objects and materials lose recognizable contexts and can be very complex. New advances in microscopes and telescopes allow us to…
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That’s Hot! The Effect of Size on Rate of Heat Loss
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Through the use of common household items such as aluminum pans and thermometers, students will investigate how the size and shape of an object affect the rate of heat loss from the object to the environment. This…
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Sweet! Exploring Surface Area of Sugar Molecules
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Two forces that are very familiar to us in our daily lives are gravity and adhesion. The force of gravity on an object, which we commonly refer to as the object’s weight, is proportional to the volume of the object.…
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Captivating Cubes: Investigating Surface Area-to-Volume Ratio
Book Chapter |
In this two-part activity, students investigate how surface area-to-volume ratios change with cube size. Students apply those calculations to explore how surface area-to-volume relationships limit the size of cells.…
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