STEM Lesson Plans

This 45-minute lesson uses the book, "How to Catch an Elf", to lead into a cooperative engineering design lesson where students work in teams to build a humane trap to capture an elf.

This is the second part of this unit on the duff layer in a forest. After learning after duff and its potential impact on forest fires in the last lesson, students will be following the engineering

In this lesson, students use the Kepler’s Laws PhET Simulation to collect data on the period and average radius of the planetary orbits. They graph and analyze that data to derive Kepler’s 3rd Law.

In this lesson students will use everything they've done in parts 1-3 to analyze how mutations affect proteins. Students will build the mutated proteins that they sequenced in part 3. They will test

In this lesson, students will be introduced to mutations in DNA. They will create beaded or illustrated "codes" to represent 5 different mutations to their original protein codes. These codes will be

In this lesson students will continue to learn about protein synthesis. At the beginning of this lesson students should know that genes have the code to make proteins. Today they will be introduced to

In this lesson students are introduced to the idea that DNA is the code to create proteins and that proteins can be structural or functional. Students are given a problem to create a model of a

This lesson is PART 4 of a four-lesson unit, which focuses on futures thinking, the phenomenon of electricity, closed-system agriculture, and water as a renewable energy resource. “The City of Ember”

This lesson is PART 3 of a four-lesson unit, which focuses on futures thinking, the phenomenon of electricity, closed-system agriculture, and water as a renewable energy resource. “The City of Ember”

This lesson is PART 2 of a four-lesson unit, which focuses on futures thinking, the phenomenon of electricity, closed-system agriculture, and water as a renewable energy resource. “The City of Ember”

This lesson is PART 1 of a four-lesson unit, which focuses on futures thinking, the phenomenon of electricity, closed-system agriculture, and water as a renewable energy resource. “The City of Ember”

This lesson is a 3-4 day lesson on Public Service Announcements for reusing commonly discarded item versus trashing them. The lessons include the power of a Public Service Announcement, components to

Students have the opportunity explore different materials that use nanotechnology and then discuss the key differences between macroscale and nanoscale impacts on those materials.

This lesson uses a PhET Simulation to allow students to collect data on the orbits of planets around our Sun, then summarize and share their results. It is designed for students in Grades 9-12.

This is a multi-day engineering design project. I use this for 2 weeks, a total of ten 50-minute periods. Students will research and design a dog house, creating a 3D model in a web-based computer

Students will learn about the light sensor on the Circuit Playground Express and how it can be used as an automatic switch to turn a device on or off. They will learn about the thermometer sensor on

Students will learn and recall about the different parts and components of an Adafruit Circuit Playground Express. Students will be able to program an Adafruit Circuit Playground Express

This lesson gives students a real world opportunity to explore area and the distributive property by designing a dream room. Students are given the total square footage and instructions to design the

In this lesson students will use their climate zone and plant information to create a model of a garden. They will use a variety of charts and graphs to determine what plants will grow best given the

Part one of a four part project exploring the movement of the brain upon impact in everyday activities. This lesson uses Pocketlab Voyager sensors to analyze brain movement in high impact activities

This is the first of 4 lessons where students will propose and configure a school garden using criteria given by the principal. Students will work in groups of 3 to determine configurations. They will

Students will use an understanding of the sun as an energy and heat source to design a device to direct the sun's heat to aid with growing plants. The students will go through the 5 E's and the

Students will explore how gravity plays a role in orbits and the attraction between objects in space, using online simulations. In addition to the online simulations this lesson contains ideas for

The students construct and interpret an HR Diagram to better understand the significance and usefulness of the diagram.