This video segment from NOVA: "The Mystery of Animal Pathfinders" explores honeybee communication and navigation.
Cocos Island, a remote volcanic summit in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, serves as a beacon for hungry predators, including thousands of hammerhead sharks that travel here each year in search of prey. This video segment from NOVA: "Island of Sharks" depicts some of the common predator-prey interactions that take place in the nutrient-rich waters surrounding the island.
In this optics activity, learners discover that when they rotate a special black and white pattern called a Benham's Disk, it produces the illusion of colored rings. Learners experiment with the speed of rotation and direction of rotation to observe varying patterns. Use this activity to explain to learners how our eyes detect color and how different color receptors in the eye respond at different rates.
This video segment from Evolution: "Extinction!" shows the impact of invasive species on native ecosystems.
This ZOOM video segment shows how to create a self-contained environment and explores evaporation, condensation, and precipitation.
This interactive resource adapted from NASA describes the different temperature, precipitation, and vegetation patterns in seven biomes: coniferous forest, temperate deciduous forest, desert, grassland, rainforest, shrubland, and tundra.
There are almost as many types of bird beaks as there are types of food that birds like to eat. This collection of images shows a wide range of beaks and the types of foods handled by each.
Throughout the day, your nervous system monitors and makes endless adjustments to your body's basic systems -- all to keep you alive. This interactive feature illustrates the complexity of such a task.
This video segment from The Human Spark observes the brains responses to a series of cognitive tests.
This presentation of a digital story (narration, images, and soundtrack in a short video) features the polar regions. The story was produced by the free, online magazine Beyond Penguins and Polar Bears.
In this interactive activity from the Building Big Web site, use your knowledge of bridge design to match the right bridge to the right location in a fictitious city.
A new instructional model, called Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI), is introduced to elementary teachers in this article. The author shows how school librarians and classroom teachers can collaborate to help students construct and communicate evidence, or arguments. Evidence buckets, a collaborative activity, and related online resources are presented. The article appears in the free online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which is structured around the seven essential principles of climate literacy.
In this interactive activity from Shedd Aquarium, build a fish and then release it into the reef to search for food and evade predators. Try different combinations and observe how each kind of fish has unique adaptations that help it survive in its habitat.
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.
How do you build a tunnel 32 miles long -- under water? This video segment adapted from Building Big, follows the construction of the Channel Tunnel (nicknamed "Chunnel"), the engineering wonder that connects England to France.
This video excerpt from NOVA’s Making Stuff: Cleaner and accompanying demonstration introduce students to the production and importance of bioplastics, or plastics made from plant or animal products.
In this nonfiction story, young readers and listeners learn how scientists use cross sections from trees to reconstruct past climates. Versions are provided for readers at two levels, k-2 and 3-5, and in text-only and illustrated formats. The story is also available as an electronic book with recorded narration. An original story is a regular feature of each issue of the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle. The story can be used in science and literacy lessons and activities throughout the magazine.
Cardboard Automata are a playful way to explore simple machine elements while creating a mechanical sculpture. This activity was inspired by the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre, a group of automata builders based in England. Artists like Paul Spooner, Keith Newstead, and Carlos Zapata build beautiful narrative pieces using elegant mechanisms based on cams, gears, springs, and linkages. Working with simple materials, this activity is easy to get started, and may become as complex as your mechanical sculpture ideas.
In this media-rich lesson, students explore careers in science through profiles of Alaska Native scientists. They consider how traditional ways of knowing and Western approaches to science can complement each other and allow students to incorporate their own interests when considering careers in science.