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Build and Test a Model Solar House

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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.

Material Type: Activity/Lab, Assessment, Diagram/Illustration, Lecture Notes, Student Guide

Author: The Concord Consortium

Shake Alert!: Making every second count.

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The high school earth and physical science unit moves through an exploration of tectonic plates, why and how they move, and the earthquakes that they cause. As the final project, teams learn about Early Warning Systems for earthquakes and how they have saved millions of lives in other countries. Teams take on a population in Oregon and design a ShakeAlert system to give them the seconds required to prepare for a mega earthquake.

Material Type: Activity/Lab, Case Study, Lesson Plan, Reading, Unit of Study

Authors: Holly Lynn, Joe Emery, Lisa Livelybrooks

Population Growth Curves

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Using Avida-ED freeware, students control a few factors in an environment populated with digital organisms, and then compare how changing these factors affects population growth. They experiment by altering the environment size (similar to what is called carrying capacity, the maximum population size that an environment can normally sustain), the initial organism gestation rate, and the availability of resources. How systems function often depends on many different factors. By altering these factors one at a time, and observing the results, students are able to clearly see the effect of each one.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Jeff Farell, Jennifer Doherty, Wendy Johnson

Acoustic Mirrors

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Students play and record the “Mary Had a Little Lamb” song using musical instruments and analyze the intensity of the sound using free audio editing and recording software. Then they use hollow Styrofoam half-spheres as acoustic mirrors (devices that reflect and focus sound), determine the radius of curvature of the mirror and calculate its focal length. Students place a microphone at the acoustic mirror focal point, re-record their songs, and compare the sound intensity on plot spectrums generated from their recordings both with and without the acoustic mirrors. A worksheet and KWL chart are provided.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Nick Breen, Steven C. Thedford

Create a Safe Bungee Cord for Washy!

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Students learn about the role engineers and mathematicians play in developing the perfect bungee cord length by simulating and experimenting with bungee jumping using washers and rubber bands. Working as if they are engineers for a (hypothetical) amusement park, students are challenged to develop a show-stopping bungee jumping ride that is safe. To do this, they must find the maximum length of the bungee cord that permits jumpers (such as brave Washy!) to get as close to the ground as possible without going "splat"! This requires them to learn about force and displacement and run an experiment. Student teams collect and plot displacement data and calculate the slope, linear equation of the line of best fit and spring constant using Hooke's law. Students make hypotheses, interpret scatter plots looking for correlations, and consider possible sources of error. An activity worksheet, pre/post quizzes and a PowerPoint® presentation are included.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Author: Marc Frank

MISA HS Sample Item Set - Wind Turbines (PS/ESS)

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Sample high school MISA test item set which uses a physics and earth space science performance expectations.  The Item set focuses on wind turbines and their environmental impacts. It contains 5 questions and one constructed response for a total of 9 points. (Image source: “Wind Turbine” by Painter06 at Pixabay.com.)  

Material Type: Lesson Plan

Authors: Melissa Kaye-Kamauff, Jeremy Haack, MSDE Admin, Laura Garfinkel

Bacteria Transformation

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Students construct paper recombinant plasmids to simulate the methods genetic engineers use to create modified bacteria. They learn what role enzymes, DNA and genes play in the modification of organisms. For the particular model they work on, they isolate a mammal insulin gene and combine it with a bacteria's gene sequence (plasmid DNA) for production of the protein insulin.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Kimberly Anderson, Matthew Zelisko

Blood Clots, Polymers and Strokes

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Students are introduced to the circulatory system with an emphasis on the blood clotting process, including coagulation and the formation and degradation of polymers through their underlying atomic properties. They learn about the medical emergency of strokes the loss of brain function commonly due to blood clots including various causes and the different effects depending on the brain location, as well as blood clot removal devices designed by biomedical engineers.

Material Type: Lesson Plan

Authors: Ann McCabe, Azim Laiwalla, Carleigh Samson, Victoria Lanaghan

Bone Crusher

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Students use a tension-compression machine (or an alternative bone-breaking setup) to see how different bones fracture differently and with different amounts of force, depending on their body locations. Teams determine bone mass and volume, calculate bone density, and predict fracture force. Then they each test a small animal bone (chicken, turkey, cat) to failure, examining the break to analyze the fracture type. Groups conduct research about biomedical challenges, materials and repair methods, and design repair treatment plans specific to their bones and fracture types, presenting their design recommendations to the class.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Andrea Lee, Megan Ketchum

Applying Hooke's Law to Cancer Detection

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Students explore Hooke's law while working in small groups at their lab benches. They collect displacement data for springs with unknown spring constants, k, by adding various masses of known weight. After exploring Hooke's law and answering a series of application questions, students apply their new understanding to explore a tissue of known surface area. Students then use the necessary relationships to depict a cancerous tumor amidst normal tissue by creating a graph in Microsoft Excel.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Author: Luke Diamond

Waves: The Three Color Mystery

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Students are presented with a challenge question concerning color blindness and asked to use engineering principles to design devices to help people who are color blind. Using the legacy cycle as a model, this unit is comprised of five lessons designed to teach wave properties, the electromagnetic spectrum, and the anatomy of the human eye in an interactive format that introduces engineering applications and real-world references. It culminates with an activity in which student teams apply what they have learned to design devices that can aid people with colorblindness in distinguishing colors— as evidenced by their creation of brainstorming posters, descriptive brochures and short team presentations, as if they were engineers reporting to clients. Through this unit, students become more aware of the connections between the biology of the eye and the physical science concept of light, and gain an understanding of how those scientific concepts relate to the field of engineering.

Material Type: Unit of Study

Author: Courtney Faber

Catalysts

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There are two types of catalysis reactions: homogeneous and heterogeneous. In a homogeneous reaction, the catalyst is in the same phase as the reactants. In a heterogeneous reaction, the catalyst is in a different phase from the reactants. This activity addresses homogeneous catalysis.

Material Type: Data Set, Diagram/Illustration

Author: The Concord Consortium

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