How does the dirt get out of your drinking water? A hands-on activity introduces the use of flocculants to help clear solid particles out of water. The plan walks learners through the process of setting up an experiment that...

I can move about freely, but you cannot. The class models the movement through cell membranes by way of passive and active transport. Members of the class play the roles of various proteins, atoms, compounds, and cell actions and mimic...

In this mind-bending activity, young engineers explore this question of whether or not light actually bends. Using holographic diffraction gratings, groups design and build a spectrograph. The groups then move on research a problem...

While the French were once the allies of Americans, the Napoleonic Wars saw the United States almost drawn into a war with its one-time friend. Wars in Europe threatened to draw in the early republic. A primary source-based activity...

It's time for pupils to read, examine, and contemplate literature to explore the difference between vivid and generic verbs. Pupils distinguish between the two types of verbs as they read the ghost scene from Shakespeare's Hamlet. They...

Nanotechnology is described for emerging engineers. Instructions for converting nanometers to meters is provided. Finally, the step-by-step laboratory procedure for measuring the size of an oil molecule is walked through. What a terrific...

"We, the People of the State of Alabama. . ." Did you know that the Alabama State Constitution has 357,157 words while the US Constitution has only 4,400? And that it has 798 amendments while the US Constitution has...

Who exactly was George C. Wallace? A great lesson plan provides young historians with a hands-on activity, direct instruction, and discussion to learn about Wallace, why he was an important figure, and why he changed his mind about...

Such an ambitious lesson! Third graders with special needs listen to an audio recording of the novel, Moby Dick. They stop often to discuss each of the main characters and analyze their actions in the story. They then make puppets of one...

Art and architecture go hand-in-hand. Kids watch clips from the Hayo Miyazaki film Spirited Away to better understand Japanese customs and architecture. The discussion questions included are very good, and will help you lead the class in...

How far would your pupils go to be able to have access to books? Revisit Heather Henson and David Small's That Book Woman and challenge class members to take on the role of Cal or the Book Woman. By putting themselves in someone else's...

Show your class how to read a map and decipher all of the markings and features. Start out by connecting maps to their homework from the night before and their current reading, in this case That Book Woman, and a related informational...

Ease into informational text with the instructional activity suggested here. Part of a unit series, the instructional activity draws from previous lessons and acts as a natural moment to add in informational text. Class members read one...

Ask your learners to synthesize what they know about Waiting for the Biblioburro by writing a well-organized paragraph. Young writers focus on using transition words and including specific details in their paragraphs. The plan allows for...

Focus on similarities and differences with a jigsaw activity that requires pupils to compare Waiting for the Biblioburro to other texts they have read. To prepare, class members first respond to text-dependent questions, moving on to...

Expose your class to Waiting for the Biblioburro, narrative nonfiction that will act as the bridge between ficiton and informational texts to come. Class members do a close reading of the text, looking at excerpts instead of the whole...

Explore Japanese society and national identity. Class members share ideas about the Japanese economy and then investigate a series of resources, including an article, a film, a lecture, and a poem, to learn about Japan's Bubble Economy...

Effective researchers use a variety of techniques to find what they need online. Pupils who complete the activities listed here should already have an arsenal of strategies for searching. They will learn about and practice two new...

Research was very different in the past. Pupils once had difficulty finding sufficient information, but now they have the opposite problem. Show your class how to pick the best resources out of the millions of sites an online search will...

What kind of text features help children build a strong vocabulary? Class members use text features such as headers to unpack new vocabulary words. They create vocabulary journals in which they will write what they think the definition...

Whether you are an art teacher or a teacher looking for a great project to finish off a unit on the rainforest, this instructional activity is for you. Here are some great teaching tips and instructional practices that can help you and...

Who is Wassily Kandinsky? Introduce your young artists to the wonders of abstract nonobjective art through music. They'll listen to music as they cut, paste, and paint emotional works of art. The activity suggests the use of soothing...

Sand has been used as an artistic medium for centuries and can be found in cultures across the globe. The class examines sand art created by the Navajo people. They mix tempera paint and sand to create their colors, and then fill jars,...