How tall is your marshmallow structure? Using only limited supplies (including uncooked spaghetti noodles, masking tape, and one marshmallow), teams endeavor to support the marshmallow atop the tallest spaghetti structure they can build....

Challenge games and cooperative games are in abundance. This is the lesson plans home page  for a wide range of challenge games that promote teamwork, cooperation, trust and communication. There are many links included in this page...

The video clip that comprises the warm up is not available, but the related article from The New York Times and the movie trailer for Aliens of the Deep are, leaving enough material to make this a fascinating lesson on deep-sea...

This is an intermediate level challenge game that comes from a ropes course curriculum. As with most challenges for a ropes course, there is focus on communication, trust, decision making, and mostly, cooperation. There are links that...

This challenge game activity focuses on not just following directions, but on active listening as the players receiving the directions are blindfolded. The players giving directions need to be clear and concise in telling the blindfolded...

Grand Canyon II is an advanced level game for a Ropes Course. It challenges a group of learners to swing on a rope from Cliff One to Cliff Two, without touching the ground. There are penalties for touching the ground. This...

This is the skeleton lesson of a cooperative challenge game. This lesson assumes the teacher is familiar with cooperative games. If you are familiar then you have probably already done an activity like this one.

Toxic waste transfer is an intermediate level challenge game for a Ropes Course. A group of students, who are holding ropes attached to a five-gallon bucket filled with simulated toxic waste, transport it across an open space. This will...

Students are to research a specific disaster after seeing the Challenger explosion. They are to create a collage for the disaster they are choosing to show.

Students work in groups to complete challenges. In this cooperation, endurance and strength lesson, students complete challenges from their Survivor Challenge Task Card and when complete, do the closing challenge together.

Learners conduct Internet research in order to better understand the concepts of sustainable health design. For this design and architecture lesson, students gather data and creat a materials kit that responds to the challenges of health...

Skywriters is an introductory challenge games from ropes course material. It focuses on communnication, team cooperation, trust, and problem solving. There is a link to several more challenge games.

Engineering design projects serve as great opportunities for collaborative problem solving. In this case, students work in small groups designing, building, and eventually testing a structure that meets a teacher-specified objective. It...

In this mind challenging worksheet, students study and analyze the most strategic path to follow to find their way through a circle maze from the entrance to the exit of the maze.

A little bit complicated, but a whole lot of fun. Show your class an episode of the British television game show Just a Minute. After an explanation of the rules (no repetition, hesitation, or deviation) groups develop topics, based on...

Imagine having no control over your life and then suddenly having to provide for yourself. Such was the challenge faced by many American slaves after emancipation. Class members are asked to consider these challenges are they examine...

After experiencing how quick and easy it is to make judgments as part of an opening activity, learners discuss the concept of a stereotype and the need to think critically and question our immediate assumptions.

Two scenarios are presented for chemistry detectives to decipher. Both require the use of an infrared spectrometer and focus on the examination of polymer materials. In the first, lumps in polyethylene bottles are analyzed. In the...

Students investigate the characteristics of simple machines. In this simple machine lesson, students investigate work as a product of applying constant force. They answer questions about what happens on Earth and what may have happened...

Links to two different versions of this mapping activity are available. In "The Small Version," youngsters design a town, keeping the water supply in mind. In "The Large Version," they also design a town, but they consider services and...

Check out a lesson plan that starts with force of gravity and moves through the concepts of mass, weight, volume, and density. Learners calculate density, test the buoyancy of objects, and then demonstrate understanding by altering the...

"Leadership is learned, and everyone has the potential to be a leader." From modeling the way to encouraging the heart, learners discover the five practices of exemplary leadership through a series of rich, hands-on, collaborative...

Speaking of the Internet. The culminating lesson for the unit on the Internet challenges pupils to prepare short, two-minute speeches on an issue facing society. The pupils chose from three topics that connect the Internet and...

A lesson about following directions tests learners' ability with a tricky scenario that will shock unsuspecting participants. After viewing results, scholars discuss why it's important to follow instructions and define listening. Peers...