Students reconstruct the skeleton of the fossil Scaphognathus crassirostis. For this fossil lesson plan, students discuss the Kingdoms of life, geologic history and the history of the skeletons of species. Students are given 20 minutes...

High schoolers go on an imaginary fossil hunt. They follow a script read by the teacher, students "find" (remove from envelope) paper "fossils" of some unknown creature. They attempt to reconstruct fossil pieces into an animal.

Students receive bloodstain pattern evidence from a crime scene. They answer a series of questions through inquiry, observation, measurement, and analysis. Pupils complete this challenge, by reconstructing the evidence through four...

What can young scientists discover from dissecting an owl pellet? Explore the owl food chain, beginning with an introduction to these predatory birds. Suggested strategies here include creating a podcast and purchasing a poster, however...

Construct a three-dimensional optical illusion when your class is exploring vision and how the eye and brain work together. Three concave corners are mounted inside of a black box, but as a light is shined upon them, they appear to be...

Students visit an outdoors area and mark out a square on the ground that they examine, looking for living and non-living things. They make a model or drawing of the findings from the actual square.

Pupils explore data collection in this lesson. They investigate distance vs. time and velocity vs. time graphs using information collected with a CBR 2 to simulate the reconstruction of an accident.

Young scholars identify and interpret the type of evidence found at a typical dinosaur dig and mimic a paleontologist by taking crayon rubbings of simulated bone impressions. After the rubbings are taken, the students reconstruct the...

Studentsare able to understand the three ways foosils were created. They are able to make a reconstruction of a puzzle or draw a picture based on cluses and limited pieces of the puzzle or animal. Students are able to explain how fossils...

Students discover a part of the natural food chain through the dissection of owl pellets. They compare, identify, and record rodent skeletal parts they find in the pellet to skeletal diagrams and try to reconstruct a skeleton from the...

Students complete a long-term research project on prairie grasses and forbs. They develop research questions, collect and analyze data from reconstructed prairie plots, and publish their research data on a Prairie website.

Students reorganize sentence strips into paragraphs to learn about seagrasses. They learn vocabulary and facts about sea grasses using the paragraphs once they are reconstructed. They continue their study with a number of associated...

Students measure a topographic and geologic cross-section across a floodplain using simple surveying and auguring techniques in a field lab. Students also reconstruct the history of a river system.

An extensive investigation of the Earth's climate changes awaits your environmental science classes. This top-notch presentation begins by looking at the history of Earth's climate and then predicts the impact on each major terrestrial...

Learn about the destruction of the rainforest by analyzing statistics. Young learners make an original line graph showing destruction in the rainforest. Additional activities include making a collage, sequencing Dr. Seuss' The...

Take a close look at news reporting techniques and global issues. Begin by creating a graphic representation of developing nations and defining the term. After class discussion, the second day's activities pick up by deconstructing news...

Take the old baking soda and vinegar volcano to the next level by using it to study repeated lava flows over time, examine geologic features on Earth and Mars, and speculate about some of the formations on Mars. 

Students examine how to locate and access data sets.  In this climate change lesson students import data into Excel and graph it.   

Tons of photographs, diagrams, animations, and satellite images fill the slides of an education earth science presentation. It begins with volcanic activity and earthquakes, and then moves into plate tectonics, boundaries, and driving...

Students investigate radioactivity as a tool for measuring geologic time and how geologists use this information to determine the absolute age of rocks or minerals.

Students experience, through a "dig," the historical discovery of fossils which increasingly link whales to earlier land-dwelling mammals. They encounter the intermediate forms which show changes that lead to the modern whale.

In this tree-ring dating activity, students use activity sheets to determine a tree's age and to observe changes in climate from the tree-rings. Students investigate how archaeologists use tree rings to date evidence and they answer 5...

Students investigate the anatomy of a frog using a virtual dissection tool in order to study the structures and organ as they relate to other animals.

Students, after researching a Texas coastal basin, map and graph the information they collect and then translate it into a short report to be presented to their classmates. They brainstorm unique ways to maintain Texas estuaries as well...