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Surface Tension Lab
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Students extend their understanding of surface tension by exploring the real-world engineering problem of deciding what makes a "good" soap bubble. Student teams first measure this property, and then use this measurement to determine the best soap solution for making bubbles. They experiment with additives to their best soap and water "recipes" to increase the strength or longevity of the bubbles. In a math homework, students perform calculations that explain why soap bubbles form spheres.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Chuan-Hua Chen
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Surface Tension and Suminagashi
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Educational Use
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In an activity that integrates science and art, students see, experience and harness the phenomenon of surface tension as they create beautiful works of art. Students conduct two experiments related to surface tension floating objects on the surface of water and creating original artwork using floating inks. They also learn historical and cultural information through an introduction to the ancient Japanese art form of suminagashi. They take the topic a step further by discussing how an understanding of surface tension can be applied to solve real-world engineering problems and create useful inventions.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
David Hu
Steve Shaw
Date Added:
10/14/2015
Surfactants: Helping Molecules Get Along
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Educational Use
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Students learn about the basics of molecules and how they interact with each other. They learn about the idea of polar and non-polar molecules and how they act with other fluids and surfaces. Students acquire a conceptual understanding of surfactant molecules and how they work on a molecular level. They also learn of the importance of surfactants, such as soaps, and their use in everyday life. Through associated activities, students explore how surfactant molecules are able to bring together two substances that typically do not mix, such as oil and water. This lesson and its associated activities are easily scalable for grades 3-12.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Material Type:
Lesson Plan
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Ryan Cates
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Survive That Tsunami!
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Educational Use
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Students use a table-top-sized tsunami generator to observe the formation and devastation of a tsunami. They see how a tsunami moves across the ocean and what happens when it reaches the continental shelf. Students make villages of model houses and buildings to test how different material types are impacted by the huge waves. They further discuss how engineers design buildings to survive tsunamis. Much of this activity setup is the same as for the Mini-Landscape activity in Lesson 4 of the Natural Disasters unit.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Oceanography
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Denise Carlson
Geoffrey Hill
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Date Added:
10/14/2015
Sustainable Energy: Can Water be the Future Fuel?
Conditional Remix & Share Permitted
CC BY-NC-SA
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The main objective of this video lesson is to bring the students' attention to the importance of basic and natural sciences in our lives. The lesson will introduce a topic (sustainable energy) that is related mainly to chemistry and is not usually covered directly in a high school curriculum. We hope that this lesson will show students how important and useful the natural and basic sciences are not only for our daily lives, but also for sustainable development. The lesson will present creative and challenging ideas on the topic of alternative energies. It is hoped that students will be inspired by the introduction of these ideas, and that they will develop the confidence to come up with creative ideas themselves. Background for this lesson is based on fundamental concepts in chemistry (mainly), biology, physics and environmental science.

Subject:
Chemistry
Physical Science
Material Type:
Lecture
Provider:
MIT
Provider Set:
MIT Blossoms
Author:
Ahmad Al-Ajlouni
Date Added:
03/18/2020
Swamp Cooler
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Educational Use
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Using a household fan, cardboard box and paper towels, student teams design and build their own evaporative cooler prototype devices. They learn about the process that cools water during the evaporation of water. They make calculations to determine a room's cooling load, and thus determine the swamp cooler size. This activity adds to students' understanding of the behind-the-scenes mechanical devices that condition and move air within homes and buildings for human health and comfort.

Subject:
Architectural Drafting
Construction Science Technologies
Engineering and Information Technologies
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Denise W. Carlson
Landon B. Gennetten
Lauren Cooper
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Date Added:
10/14/2015
Swim to and from the Sea!
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Educational Use
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Students are introduced to the basic biology behind Pacific salmon migration and the many engineered Columbia River dam structures that aid in their passage through the river's hydroelectric dams. Students apply what they learn about the salmon life cycle as they think of devices and modifications that might be implemented at dams to aid in the natural cycle of fish migration, and as they make (hypothetical) Splash Engineering presentations about their proposed fish mitigation solutions for Birdseye River's dam in Thirsty County.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Hydrology
Physical Science
Material Type:
Lesson Plan
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Denise W. Carlson
Jeff Lyng
Kristin Field
Lauren Cooper
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Tension Racers!
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Educational Use
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Students see how different levels of surface tension affect water's ability to move. Teams "race" water droplets down tracks made of different materials, making measurements, collecting data, making calculations, graphing results and comparing to their predictions and the properties of each surface, determining which surface exhibits the highest (or lowest) level of surface tension with water. They apply their results to make engineering recommendations for real-world applications.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Mathematics
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Ryan Cates
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Things That Matter to Flocculants
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Educational Use
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Prior to reaching households, water is exposed to a variety of treatments designed to render it fit for human consumption and use. One of the first treatment steps is the removal of suspended solids using chemical additives called flocculants. In this activity, students learn about two commonly used flocculants and clean water collected from a local pond or river. They experiment with flocculant, stirring and pH variables.

Subject:
Chemistry
Ecology
Engineering and Information Technologies
Life Science
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Audrey Buttice
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Too Much Pressure!
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Educational Use
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In this activity, students learn how engineers design faucets. Students will learn about water pressure by building a simple system to model faucets and test the relationship between pressure, area and force. This is a great outdoor activity on a warm day.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Chris Sheridan
Jackie Sullivan
Janet Yowell
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Melissa Straten
Date Added:
10/14/2015
Tracing Fluorescent Plastics in an Aquatic Environment
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Educational Use
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Student teams investigate the migration of small-particle plastic pollution by exposing invertebrates found in water samples from a local lake or river to fluorescent bead fragments in a controlled environment of their own designs. Students begin by reviewing the composition of food webs and considering the ethics of studies on live organisms. In their model microcosms, they set up a food web so as to trace the microbead migration from one invertebrate species to another. Students use blacklights and microscopes to observe and quantify their experimental results. They develop diagrams that explain their investigations—modeling the ecological impacts of microplastics.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Life Science
Mathematics
Measurement and Data
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
Activities
Author:
David Bennett
Sara Hettenbach
William Welch
Date Added:
06/01/2018
Transportation and the Environment
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Educational Use
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Looking at transportation and the environment, students learn that some human-made creations, such as vehicles, can harm the environment. They also learn about alternative fuels and vehicles designed by engineers to minimize pollution. The associated hands-on activity gives students a chance to design their own eco-friendly vehicle.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Lesson Plan
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Abigail Watrous
Denali Lander
Janet Yowell
Katherine Beggs
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Tsunami Attack!
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Educational Use
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Students learn about tsunamis, discovering what causes them and what makes them so dangerous. They learn that engineers design detection and warning equipment, as well as structures that that can survive the strong wave forces. In a hands-on activity, students use a table-top-sized tsunami generator to observe the formation and devastation of a tsunami. They see how a tsunami moves across the ocean and what happens when it reaches a coastline. They make villages of model houses to test how different material types are impacted by the huge waves.

Subject:
Atmospheric Science
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Lesson Plan
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Denise W. Carlson
Geoffrey Hill
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Under Pressure
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Educational Use
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Students learn about Pascal's law, an important concept behind the engineering of dam and lock systems, such as the one that Thirsty County wants Splash Engineering to design for the Birdseye River (an ongoing hypothetical engineering scenario). Students observe the behavior of water in plastic water bottles spilling through holes punctured at different heights, seeing the distance water spurts from the holes, learning how water at a given depth exerts equal pressure in all directions, and how water at increasing depths is under increasing pressure.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Denali Lander
Denise W. Carlson
Jeff Lyng
Kristin Field
Lauren Cooper
Megan Podlogar
Timothy M. Dittrich
Date Added:
09/18/2014
An Underground River
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Educational Use
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Groundwater is one of the largest sources of drinking water, so environmental engineers need to understand groundwater flow in order to tap into this important resource. Environmental engineers also study groundwater to predict where pollution from the surface may end up. In this lesson, students will learn how water flows through the ground, what an aquifer is and what soil properties are used to predict groundwater flow.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Hydrology
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Lesson Plan
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Janet Yowell
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Melissa Straten
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Water, A Liquid
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This review is on the first segment of the Grade 5 curriculum of "The Inquiry Project: Seeing the World Through the Scientists' Eyes." Water, A Liquid is a series of 5 investigations about water. Students use readily available materials such as water, sand and gravel to deepen their understanding of weight. Having a conceptual understanding of weight is important because students will use it when they begin exploring matter that is too small to be seen. The students are introduced to the study of matter by looking at images of ships sitting in a dry seabed in the Aral Sea. This introductory investigation will hook students because it is posed as a mystery and has a real life connection. Within this series of 5 investigations students will: -practice measurement using standard units -collect and record data -read a letter from an engineer -compare the weight of sand and water -use a digital scale -learn vocabulary -review volume, estimation -engage in discourse -reflect on the weight of small bits of matter -summarize evidence -collaborate -develop strategies -observe -transform (by crushing). The Inquiry Project is a quality curriculum developed pre-NGSS but closely aligned with The Framework of K-12 Science Education. This curriculum "links the three dimensions together" through the qualitative and quantitative measurement of water and sand using standard units and student observations. Each lesson is "designed to link with the previous lesson" as students build toward the capacity to be able to "make observations and measurements to identify materials based on their properties" in the context of the dry sea phenomena.

Subject:
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
National Science Teachers Association (NSTA)
Provider Set:
NGSS@NSTA
Date Added:
02/24/2020
Water Desalination Plant
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Educational Use
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Students use a thermal process approach to design, build and test a small-scale desalination plant that is capable of significantly removing the salt content from a saltwater solution. Students use a saltwater circuit to test the efficiency of their model desalination plant and learn how the water cycle is the basis for the thermal processes that drive their desalination plant.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Hydrology
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Carleigh Samson
Denise W. Carlson
Juan Ramirez Jr.
Stephanie Rivale
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Water Filtration
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Educational Use
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Students are asked to design methods to filter water using ordinary materials, while also considering their designs' material and cost efficiencies. They learn about the importance of water and its role in our everyday lives. They come to understand what must occur each day so that they can have clean water.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Hydrology
Physical Science
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Erik Rushton
Erin Santini
Date Added:
09/18/2014
Water Power
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Educational Use
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Students observe a model waterwheel to investigate the transformations of energy involved in turning the blades of a hydro-turbine. Students work as engineers to create model waterwheels while considering resources such as time and materials, in their design. Students also discuss and explore the characteristics of hydropower plants.

Subject:
Engineering and Information Technologies
Physical Science
Physics
Material Type:
Activity/Lab
Provider:
TeachEngineering
Provider Set:
TeachEngineering
Author:
Amy Kolenbrander
Janet Yowell
Jessica Todd
Malinda Schaefer Zarske
Date Added:
10/14/2015