What starts out as a cascade of well-mixed granular materials sorts itself into alternating layers of salt and sand.
Students are introduced to the concept of engineering biological organisms and studying their growth to be able to identify periods of fast and slow growth. They learn that bacteria are found everywhere, including on the surfaces of our hands. Student groups study three different conditions under which bacteria are found and compare the growth of the individual bacteria from each source. In addition to monitoring the quantity of bacteria from differ conditions, they record the growth of bacteria over time, which is an excellent tool to study binary fission and the reproduction of unicellular organisms.
Students visualize and interact with concepts already learned, specifically algebraic equations and solving for unknown variables. They construct a balancing seesaw system (LEGO® Balance Scale) made from LEGO MINDSTORMS® parts and digital components to mimic a balancing scale. They are given example algebraic equation problems to analyze, configure onto the balance scale, and evaluate by manipulating LEGO pieces and gram masses that represent terms of an equation such as unknown variables, coefficients and integers. Digital light sensors, built into the LEGO Balance Scale, detect any balance or imbalances displayed on the balancing scale. The LEGO Balance Scale interactively issues a digital indication of balance or imbalance within the system. If unbalanced, students continue using the LEGO Balance Scale until they are confident in their understanding of solving algebraic equations. The goal is for students to become confident in solving algebraic equations by fundamentally understanding the basics of algebra and real-world algebraic applications.
This webpage from Exploratorium provides an activity that demonstrates the Bernoulli principle with readily available materials. In this activity a table tennis ball is levitated in a stream of air from a vacuum cleaner. The site provides an explanation of what happens, asks questions about the activity, and also describes applications to flight. This activity is part of Exploratorium's Science Snacks series.
How do you know if a chemical equation is balanced? What can you change to balance an equation? Play a game to test your ideas!
In this quick and simple activity, learners explore how the distribution of the mass of an object determines the position of its center of gravity, its angular momentum, and your ability to balance it. Learners discover it is easier to balance a wooden dowel on the tip of their fingers when a lump of clay is near the top of the stick. Use this activity to introduce learners to rotational inertia.
The simulation shows a ballistics cart. If the cart is at rest on a horizontal surface, it will shoot a ball straight up in the air, and catch the ball again. What if, as in this simulation, the cart is traveling at a constant velocity horizontally, instead? Will the ball land ahead of the cart, in the cart, or behind the cart? Note that the cart fires the ball straight up, with respect to the cart, when the middle of the cart passes the small vertical trigger on the track.
Use the buttons to select the different modes (whether there is a tunnel or not, and whether to show the velocity vectors).
Students follow the steps of the engineering design process as they design and construct balloons for aerial surveillance. After their first attempts to create balloons, they are given the associated Estimating Buoyancy lesson to learn about volume, buoyancy and density to help them iterate more successful balloon designs.Applying their newfound knowledge, the young engineers build and test balloons that fly carrying small flip cameras that capture aerial images of their school. Students use the aerial footage to draw maps and estimate areas.
Experiment with a helium balloon, a hot air balloon, or a rigid sphere filled with different gases. Discover what makes some balloons float and others sink.
Explore the origin of energy bands in crystals of atoms. The structure of these bands determines how materials conduct electricity.
CK-12 Basic Physics - Second Edition updates CK-12 Basic Physics and is intended to be used as one small part of a multifaceted strategy to teach physics conceptually and mathematically.
Students hypothesize whether vinegar and ammonia-based glass cleaner are acids or bases. They create designs on index cards using these substances as invisible inks. After the index cards have dried, they apply red cabbage juice as an indicator to reveal the designs.
"This course covers the following questions. What are the predominant heat producing elements of the Earth? Where and how much are they? Are they present in the core of the Earth? Detection of antineutrinos generated in the Earth provides: 1) information on the sources of the terrestrial heat, 2) direct test of the Bulk Silicate Earth (BSE) model and 3) testing of non-conventional models of Earth's core. Use of antineutrinos to probe the deep interior of our planet is becoming practical due to recent fundamental advances in the antineutrino detectors."
This course introduces impact craters of the Earth. There are now 170 identified impact craters on the Earth, and this number is growing, ever since the well known discovery of Meteor Crater in 1920s. Currently, multi/inter disciplinary research studies of impact structures are getting conducted in fields like mineralogy, petrology, environmental geology and marine biology. This course is offered during the Independent Activities Period (IAP), which is a special 4-week term at MIT that runs from the first week of January until the end of the month.
Contains instructions on how to make bath bombs and the sciencce behind why they fizz.
This is a nice end-of-term activity.
Look inside a resistor to see how it works. Increase the battery voltage to make more electrons flow though the resistor. Increase the resistance to block the flow of electrons. Watch the current and resistor temperature change.
Look inside a battery to see how it works. Select the battery voltage and little stick figures move charges from one end of the battery to the other. A voltmeter tells you the resulting battery voltage.
Objective
SWBAT understand the importance of writing and following specific directions in the science classroom through a hands-on activity.
Big Idea
Giving and following directions is an important skill in the science classroom. This lesson provides students with an opportunity to realize the importance of this skill.
When you spin it around, this toy sounds like a swarm of buzzing bees.
The PhET project at the University of Colorado creates "fun, interactive, research-based simulations of physical phenomena." This particular one deals with Beer's Law. "The thicker the glass, the darker the brew, the less the light that passes through." Make colorful concentrated and dilute solutions and explore how much light they absorb and transmit using a virtual spectrophotometer! The simulation is also paired with a teachers' guide and related resources from PhET. The simulation is also available in multiple languages.