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Type: Lesson Plan

Students will investigate and describe different types of forces. They will complete an engineering design to build the fastest roller coaster. Students will use variables (distance and time) that change in relationship to each other to solve a real world problem.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this MEA, students will select the robots that are more efficient at doing a certain type of job. They will have to analyze data tables that include force, force units, mass, mass units, and friction.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. MEAs resemble engineering problems and encourage students to create solutions in the form of mathematical and scientific models. Students work in teams to apply their knowledge of science and mathematics to solve an open-ended problem while considering constraints and tradeoffs. Students integrate their ELA skills into MEAs as they are asked to clearly document their thought processes. MEAs follow a problem-based, student-centered approach to learning, where students are encouraged to grapple with the problem while the teacher acts as a facilitator. To learn more about MEAs visit: https://www.cpalms.org/cpalms/mea.aspx

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will analyze an informational text that addresses what causes lightning and thunder. The text also outlines ways to stay safe during a lightning storm. This informational text is designed to support reading in the content area. The lesson plan includes a note-taking guide, text-dependent questions, a writing prompt, answer keys, and a writing rubric.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will analyze an informational text that describes the physics of roller coasters. This informational text is designed to support reading in the content area. The article was written to answer the question, "Why don't I fall out when a roller coaster goes upside down?" The article is an interesting combination of scientific information about physics of roller coasters along with some fun facts. The lesson plan includes text-dependent questions, a writing prompt, answer keys, and a writing rubric.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will explore, observe, and infer about the properties and behaviors of magnets by conducting their own experiments with the magnets and the differences between contact and non-contact forces. Students will plan and design a magnetic levitation device using the engineering design process.

Type: Lesson Plan

A centers-based investigation of contact and action-at-a-distance forces with a performance assessment summative. Students will explore the different types of forces in a group work centers approach. After reviewing the data gathered, students will demonstrate the ability to define where each of these forces can found in the real world. Students will be engaged in cooperation and argumentation to achieve these goals.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson focuses on students being able to identify the difference between contact and non-contact forces. This lesson includes a presentation that shows students contact forces and non-contact forces and has students make a booklet to organize information they have learned.

Type: Lesson Plan

This STEM lesson is a lesson to be done over 3-4 sessions of 45 minutes, possibly longer for inclusion students who will need more direction. It involves lots of collaboration and the Engineering Design Process.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will investigate Newton's 3 Laws of Motion as it relates to rocketry by constructing a balloon rocket. They will collect data, calculate velocity of the balloon as it races across the string and calculate velocity and acceleration. Students will construct a Distance-Time graph and a Velocity-Time graph. Students will find the slope of the Distance-Time graph and will explain why this slope represents the velocity of the balloon. Students will further explain why they slope of the Velocity-Time graph represents the acceleration.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson uses a hands-on-approach to investigate one of the three non-contact forces. Teachers can use this lesson plan to have students explore and investigate how temperature can have an effect on the magnetic strength of a magnet.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a visual lesson that uses computer simulation and 2 short instructional videos to educate students on electrical force from a distance. It includes a PowerPoint summative test and a rubric for grading the summative.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will identify the effects of friction on the falling rates of an object in different liquids using speed calculation. With these calculations, the students will synthesize a cause/effect statement from the results comparing thickness (viscosity) of the liquid and the speed on a falling object.

Type: Lesson Plan

• This lesson helps students understand that forces affect motion and that some forces can be manipulated to be balanced or unbalanced with respect to motion. In the lesson, students use their knowledge of types of forces and free body diagrams to do an inquiry activity where they attempt to make a film canister neutrally buoyant in a 10 gal tank full of fresh water. (I have also used 2 L bottles with tops cut off and an empty pie pan to collect spillage.) Students need to predict, observe, and explain along the way as well as collect and record data to help quantify their results.
• After the lesson, students apply their new knowledge gained through experiential learning to real life scenarios in an abstract way as a formative assessment.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will identify substances capable of carrying an electric charge and those that do not. Students will be able to identify and diagram the parts of a basic series circuit, though the concepts of series and parallel circuits have not be developed yet.

Type: Lesson Plan

This Engineering Design Challenge is intended to help students apply the concepts of contact and non-contact forces as they build structures able to withstand the forces of wind and gravity. It is not intended as an initial introduction to this benchmark.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a quick lesson on contact and non-contact forces.

Type: Lesson Plan

The students will be asked to help a company choose a design to market for their new business. The company gives students four prototypes to begin with, but asks the students to create one of their own if they wish to further the research. After choosing one of the models and writing a report to declare their findings and explain their reasoning, students will then be given restrictions to the parachute. They are asked to find a material that is light yet strong, and resistant to tearing and breaking. Students will have to create parachutes using the chosen model but made with different materials to establish the best overall material.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

Use models to solve balance problems on a space station in this interactive, math and science tutorial. 

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Examine contact and non-contact forces such as gravity, electrical, and magnetic forces in this interactive tutorial.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Race car drivers discuss importance of calculating tire friction before speeding through turns.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Professional/Enthusiast

In this hands-on and web interactive project, students design and build a bird wing powerful enough to spin them in an office chair when it is flapped. By modifying the shape, size, and/or materials used in their design based on observations of natural and man-made transportation methods, students will learn about thrust, forces, durability, and energy use.

Type: Teaching Idea

This informational text resource is designed to support reading in the content area. The text describes what causes lightning and examines the science behind cloud-to-ground lightning strikes. It also discusses what causes thunder and explains why we see the lightning before we hear the thunder. The last section of the text provides important rules about lightning safety and lists ways to stay safe during a lightning storm.

Type: Text Resource

This informational text resource is designed to support reading in the content area. This short article was written to answer the question, "Why don't I fall out when a roller coaster goes upside down?" The answer to the question results in an interesting article that combines scientific information about the physics of roller coasters, along with some fun facts and photographs.

Type: Text Resource

Learn how to build an electroscope to do static electricity experiments

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

The Sun produces a solar wind — a continuous flow of charged particles — that can affect us on Earth. It can, for example, disrupt communications, navigation systems, and satellites. Solar activity can also cause power outages, such as the extensive Canadian blackout in 1989. In this video segment adapted from NASA, learn about solar storms and their effects on Earth.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

Explore the basic principles of forces and motion with this interactive simulator.

Type: Virtual Manipulative