This lesson introduces the concepts of wavelength and amplitude in transverse waves. In the associated activity, students will use ropes and their bodies to investigate different wavelengths and amplitudes.

Instructions on how to extract DNA from students cheek cells. Includes follow-up questions.

In this activity, students explore reactions in which chemical bonds are formed and broken. Students experiment with changing the temperature and the concentration of the atoms in order to see how these affect reaction rates. They also learn how to communicate what happens during a chemical reaction by writing the ratios of reactants and products, known as stoichiometry.

Students are introduced to chemical engineering and learn about its many different applications. They are provided with a basic introduction to matter and its different properties and states. An associated hands-on activity gives students a chance to test their knowledge of the states of matter and how to make observations using their five senses: touch, smell, sound, sight and taste.

Working in engineering project teams, students evaluate sites for the construction of a pyramid. They base their decision on site features as provided by a surveyor's report; distance from the quarry, river and palace; and other factors they deem important to the project based on their team's values and priorities.

To increase students' awareness of possible invisible pollutants in drinking water sources, students perform an exciting lab requiring them to think about how solutions and mixtures exist even in unsuspecting places such as ink. They use alcohol and chromatography paper to separate the components of black and colored marker ink. Students witness first-hand how components of a solution can be separated, even when those individual components are not visible in solution.

Ciensación fue creado con el apoyo de UNESCO Brasil para promover una cultura de experimentos cortos «para poner las manos en la masa» y una educación científica que estimule el desarrollo de habilidades.

El sitio web es un compilado de REA con actividades cortas de investigación —se llevan a cabo en menos de 10 minutos— que pueden incorporarse con facilidad a la enseñanza del día a día en las clases regulares. En vez de simplemente ilustrar conceptos científicos o fenómenos naturales, estos experimentos prácticos traen preguntas para que los alumnos se involucren en debates sobre la búsqueda de evidencias. Fueron elaborados para estimular el pensamiento crítico y las mentes curiosas y para que los alumnos sientan el placer de descubrir. En otras palabras: para enseñar ciencias como una actividad, como un arte fascinante que los alumnos querrán dominar.

Los docentes están invitados a publicar sus propios experimentos para «poner las manos en la masa» en Ciensación. Los experimentos enviados que pasen el proceso de revisión serán publicados como REA en portugués, español e inglés, bajo la licencia internacional Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0.

Students use the same method as in the activity from lesson 2 of this unit to explore the magnetism due to electric current instead of a permanent magnet. Students use a compass and circuit to trace the magnetic field lines induced by the electric current moving through the wire. Students develop an understanding of the effect of the electrical current on the compass needle through the induced magnetic field and understand the complexity of a three dimensional field system.

Students learn that ordinary citizens, including students like themselves, can make meaningful contributions to science through the concept of "citizen science." First, students learn some examples of ongoing citizen science projects that are common around the world, such as medical research, medication testing and donating idle computer time to perform scientific calculations. Then they explore Zooniverse, an interactive website that shows how research in areas from marine biology to astronomy leverage the power of the Internet to use the assistance of non-scientists to classify large amounts of data that is unclassifiable by machines for various reasons. To conclude, student groups act as engineering teams to brainstorm projects ideas for their own town that could benefit from community help, then design conceptual interactive websites that could organize and support the projects.

Students explore the importance and process of classification. Students apply the concept of biological classification to a real hierarchy of birds, analyzing bird photos and organizing them into groups based on physical characteristics.

Students use EOL Species Cards to sort and make observations of animals, then use the RAFT writing strategy to create short presentations about the characteristics of each major group of animals.

After learning about and observing the differences between flowering and nonflowering plants, students go outside and search for plants in schoolyard, keeping notes and drawings of their observations.

Students use a small quantity of modeling clay to make boats that float in a tub of water. The object is to build boats that hold as much weight as possible without sinking. In the process of designing and testing their prototype creations, students discover some of the basic principles of boat design, gain first-hand experience with concepts such as buoyancy and density, and experience the steps of the engineering design process.

Hydropower generation is introduced to students as a common purpose and benefit of constructing dams. Through an introduction to kinetic and potential energy, students come to understand how a dam creates electricity. They also learn the difference between renewable and non-renewable energy.

Students act as engineers contracted by NASA to create water filtration devices that clean visible particulates from teacher-prepared "dirty water." They learn about the worldwide need for potable water and gain appreciation for why water quality is an important issue for people on Earth as well as on the International Space Station. Working in groups, students experience the entire engineering design process, including a read-aloud book about the water cycle; a visiting water engineer presentation; their own online research about filter methods and designs; group brainstorming of designs (using ordinary household materials); filter construction and testing; redesign and retesting; lab book documentation of their notes, research, plans and results; and a summary poster presentation at a mini-engineering fair. Two design planning worksheets, a poster layout suggestion sheet and a grading rubric are provided.

In this lesson, students further their knowledge of redox titrations while examining the pressures that contamination and climate change put on access to clean water.

Step 1 - Inquire: Students observe a field scientist testing the dissolved oxygen content of the Hudson River and generate questions.

Step 2 - Investigate: Students apply the Winkler Method as a tool for assessing the health of bodies of water and identify the stresses placed on water sources by climate change.

Step 3 - Inspire: Students explore Sustainable Development Goal #6 and consider what steps they can take to protect the drinking water in their communities.

Students observe and discuss a simple balloon model of an electrostatic precipitator to better understand how this pollutant recovery method functions in cleaning industrial air pollution.

Students investigate decomposers and the role of decomposers in maintaining the flow of nutrients in an environment. Students also learn how engineers use decomposers to help clean up wastes in a process known as bioremediation. This lesson concludes a series of six lessons in which students use their growing understanding of various environments and the engineering design process, to design and create their own model biodome ecosystems.

Engineers design methods of removing particulate matter from industrial sources to minimize negative effects of air pollution. In this activity, students will undertake a similar engineering challenge as they design and build a filter to remove pepper from an air stream without blocking more than 50% of the air.

Posed with a paradigmatic engineering problem, students consider and explore mathematical algorithms and/or geometric concepts to devise possible solutions. The problem: How should a robotic vacuum move in order to best clean a floor of unknown shape and dimensions? They grapple with what could be a complex problem by brainstorming ideas, presenting the best idea for a solution and analyzing all presented solutions, and then are introduced to an elegant solution. Rather than elaborately calculating the most efficient route and keeping track of which tiles the robot has visited, a random number generator determines which direction the robot will take when it hits a barrier. Students are able to visually confirm how an unfamiliar programming concept (a random number generator) can make for a simple and efficient program that causes an NXT robot (that is suitably equipped) to clean a bare floor. Then students think of other uses for random numbers.