Students read news reports and first-person accounts to imagine what it would be like to be in a blackout in a large city. They follow news reports as if the event were unfolding in real-time and keep weblogs or journals of their experience as they imagine it, taking on different roles of people who live in the city or commute there to work. They use their journal accounts to create a play or screenplay that depicts what the August 2003 blackout was like for the people in the U.S. and Canada who experienced it. Although this activity is geared towards fifth-grade and older students, it could be easily adapted for younger students.

Rockets need a lot of thrust to get into space. In this lesson, students learn how rocket thrust is generated with propellant. The two types of propellants are discussed and relation to their use on rockets is investigated. Students learn why engineers need to know the different properties of propellants.

Students are introduced to our Sun as they explore its composition, what is happening inside it, its relationship to our planet (our energy source), and the ways engineers help us learn about it.

This remote learning lab manual was created to guide students in 100-level physical science courses toward meeting the first outcome in the science category of the Associate of Arts Oregon Transfer Degree:

Gather, comprehend, and communicate scientific and technical information in order to explore ideas, models, and solutions and generate further questions.

The lab design goal was to adapt existing F2F labs (already aligned to AAOT science outcome #1) for a remote learning environment without abandoning the pedagogical advantages provided by combining guided inquiry methods with specialized physics education equipment, such as digital sensors and unique demonstration apparatus. Therefore, many of the labs contain embedded videos of experiments being performed and links to open-access Google spreadsheets containing the data produced by equipment during the experiments. In many cases overlay effects have been added to videos to provide additional experimental parameters, direct students' attention to important occurrences, or and assist with understanding of the experimental methods. The data in the spreadsheets has been edited to remove irrelevant data (e.g. acceleration data automatically collected by lab software before the release of a moving fan cart).

I have found that students do require roughly 1-3 instructor interactions per lab to complete them successfully. As such, the labs current state these labs might not be amenable to a totally asynchronous learning environment.

Students design and build devices to protect and accurately deliver dropped eggs. The devices and their contents represent care packages that must be safely delivered to people in a disaster area with no road access. Similar to engineering design teams, students design their devices using a number of requirements and constraints such as limited supplies and time. The activity emphasizes the change from potential energy to kinetic energy of the devices and their contents and the energy transfer that occurs on impact. Students enjoy this competitive challenge as they attain a deeper understanding of mechanical energy concepts.

This video segment, adapted from NOVA scienceNOW, presents basic concepts of physics behind booming sand dunes. See how surface tension affects potential and kinetic energy and how it all works together to create sound.

Here’s a new “spin” on an old toy. In this modern adaptation of a classic toy—the spool racer—a plastic water bottle is propelled by energy stored in a wound-up rubber band.

Students examine how different balls react when colliding with different surfaces, giving plenty of opportunity for them to see the difference between elastic and inelastic collisions, learn how to calculate momentum, and understand the principle of conservation of momentum.

In this activity, students examine how different balls react when colliding with different surfaces. Also, they will have plenty of opportunity to learn how to calculate momentum and understand the principle of conservation of momentum.

Construct and measure the energy efficiency and solar heat gain of a cardboard model house. Use a light bulb heater to imitate a real furnace and a temperature sensor to monitor and regulate the internal temperature of the house. Use a bright bulb in a gooseneck lamp to model sunlight at different times of the year, and test the effectiveness of windows for passive solar heating.

Students build their own small-scale model roller coasters using pipe insulation and marbles, and then analyze them using physics principles learned in the associated lesson. They examine conversions between kinetic and potential energy and frictional effects to design roller coasters that are completely driven by gravity. A class competition using different marbles types to represent different passenger loads determines the most innovative and successful roller coasters.

In this video segment adapted from ZOOM, the cast shows how the 34 steps in their Rube Goldberg invention use everything from gravity to carbon dioxide gas in order to accomplish one simple task: pouring a glass of milk.

In this video segment from ZOOM, Jillian explains how her simple machine uses marbles, levers, flowing sand, and a spinning wheel to water a plant.

This assignment, depending on the level and depth of implementation, seeks to challenge students by asking them to look beyond "greenwashed" advertisements and buzzwords to grapple with what sustainability means, whether it can be achieved, and what kinds of questions communities must confront in a search for sustainability.

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A bungee jump involves jumping from a tall structure while connected to a large elastic cord. Design a bungee jump that is "safe" for a hard-boiled egg. Create a safety egg harness and connect it to a rubber band, which is your the "bungee cord." Finally, attach your bungee cord to a force sensor to measures the forces that push or pull your egg.

Students learn how to build simple piezoelectric generators to power LEDs. To do this, they incorporate into a circuit a piezoelectric element that converts movements they make (mechanical energy) into electrical energy, which is stored in a capacitor (short-term battery). Once enough energy is stored, they flip a switch to light up an LED. Students also learn how much (surprisingly little) energy can be converted using the current state of technology for piezoelectric materials.

Athletes often wear protective gear to keep themselves safe in contact sports. In this spirit, students follow the steps of engineering design process as they design, build and test protective padding for an egg drop. Many of the design considerations surrounding egg drops are similar to sports equipment design. Watching the transformation of energy from potential to kinetic, observing the impact and working under material constraints introduces students to "sports engineering" and gives them a chance to experience some of the challenges engineers face in designing equipment to protect athletes.

In this activity, learners burn a peanut, which produces a flame that can be used to boil away water and count the calories contained in the peanut. Learners use a formula to calculate the calories in a peanut and then differentiate between food calories and physicist calories as well as calories and joules.

Every form of life that we know of requires carbon. This Mini Lecture introduces to the chemically most versatile element, essential to all life, both as an energy source and as building stock. Lecture snippets of the chemists Robert Curl und Karl Ziegler explain the structure of the symmetric C60 molecule as well as the Ziegler-Natta process used to make polymers.

CK-12 Physical Science Concepts covers the study of physical science for middle school students. The 5 chapters provide an introduction to physical science, matter, states of matter, chemical interactions and bonds, chemical reactions, motion and forces, and the types and characteristics of energy.