STEM Lesson Plans

This lesson is in collaboration with the National Park Service and contains additional activities from the Jr. Ranger program. Using the NPS brochure guide/map and Plantnet app, students will identify

This hands-on lesson introduces students to gardening and the sustainability of food. Students will grow small gardens and manage them.

In this hands-on lesson, students study and record water quality readings by gaining an understanding of the significance of the readings along with the use of the correct vocabulary.

In this engaging lesson, students move the learning from within the classroom to outside its walls in order to study and record air quality readings (with no tech and tech applications). Students gain

Students will create an engineering notebook that documents their progress through the engineering design process as it applies to their choice of project, either creating a toy from “trash” or a

This is an introduction to exoplanets and their discovery. In the hands-on activity, students make a lightcurve for an exoplanet transit using data from the DIY MicroObservatory Telescope Network.

This is a virtual 360° Tour of Coronado National Memorial Cave. Students can take the tour and follow along with the resources embedded in both the tour and the lesson. Students will locate the key

In this engaging lesson, students will use Sphero robots and a Solar System map to learn intermediate level solar system geography. Students program the robots to move from one location on the map to

In this engaging lesson, students will develop an understanding of how solar panels convert sunlight into electrical energy. They will investigate factors affecting the amount of electricity generated

This hands-on lesson digs deeper into the study of weathering and erosion. It should be taught after students have an understanding of the sun’s energy and some of the ways it impacts the Earth. The

Students will build and use an anemometer to calculate wind speed and then use the wind speed to determine the affect wind has on temperature and the temperature that you feel (wind chill). Students

This lesson will allow students to measure the health of the water from sources in their community or everyday life. Students will measure the pH from different sources using test strips and a color

In this engaging lesson, students use real-world data to explore criteria for air pollutants. If students continue to the next lesson in this series, they create data-based art to deepen and

Does light have energy? In this lesson, students will engage in a practical experiment to witness how light can induce changes such as heating, altering colors, and setting objects in motion. As

In this lesson students will be able to create an identified x and y-axes and be able to plot how stars fit onto the diagram. Stars have properties (listed within the activity) and will fit into the

Students will explore the concepts of sound and rhythm through a STEM-focused lesson plan that integrates science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) with music. Students will engage in hands-on

This lesson was designed because students love to compete, and it primes them to use the Engineering Design process to build a boat and revise their design as needed. Students must use at least one

This STEAM lesson is ideal for Tucson/Pima County Middle School Students who can participate in the annual KIDStruction building contest but you can also duplicate many of the learning opportunities

In this lesson, students will research information to describe climates in different regions of the world. Then students will design a prototype of different tools used in understanding climate.

In the novel Shiloh, Marty must leave Shiloh in the woods overnight. He quickly finds materials in his shed to build Shiloh a fence and structure to protect him from elements in the woods behind his

Students read the story "Just a Second" to introduce students to geologic time. Next, they are given an activity to understand how long is 4.6 billion years. Then students complete a lab that allows

After becoming familiar with the factors that affect lift from the previous Flight Basics lesson and going over key weather concepts from this lesson, students will be expected to make a device to

Students use a 2-D physics sandbox, called Algodoo, to simulate the factors that might affect the period of a circular orbit of a planet about a star. Students develop Kepler's 3rd Law conceptually by

In this 3 day lesson plan, students will discover the relationships between the sun, earth, moon, solar/lunar eclipses and the tides.