Middle School Lessons

Astronomy

• Aurora Borealis: What Creates These Shimmering Celestial Lights?
• Collecting Micrometeorites
• Cratering in Your Classroom
• Galaxy Mapping: Why Make Maps of the Galaxies?
• Luna and Io: A Comparison Study
• Make a Comet Nucleus
• Measuring Stellar Temperatures: How Hot Is That Star?
• Meteors: What are Meteors and Where Do they Come From?
• Moon Phases: Easier Done Than Said
• Phases of the Moon
• Spotting Sunspots
• What Makes the World Turn Around?

Biology

• AIDS: What Is Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome?
• Asthma
• Balloon Safari: How Does the Mara Ecosystem in Africa Work?
• Bee Stings
• Biological Rhythyms
• Blood Typing: What Makes Different Blood Types Different?
• Body Fat: Is All Fat Bad?
• Bone Marrow: What Is a Bone Marrow Transplant and How Does It Work?
• Bones: How Do Bones Get So Strong?
• Bottle Habitats
• Brain Injury
• Broken Bones
• California Blackworms Curriculum: 7-12th grade toxicology activity
• Cancer Causes: Why Do People Get Cancer?
• Cancer Treatments: Is Cancer Curable?
• Cluster Busters: Solve disease mysteries, investigate environmental toxicants
• Cockroaches
• Coffee: How Does a Coffee Bean Become a Cup of Java?
• Diabetes: What Is Type 1 Diabetes?
• Diet and Nutrition
• DNA Fingerprinting: Can Blood Found at a Crime Scene Really Identify a Criminal?
• Dolphin Communication
• Fingerprinting: A Lesson on Classification
• Fish Heads: A Lesson on Adaptation
• Glaucoma
• Hearing: Can I Damage My Hearing by Listening to Loud Music?
• High Jump: How Do High Jumpers Set New Records?
• Hip Replacement: How Do Artificial Implants Work in the Body?
• How Do Sharks Find Their Prey?: A Lesson in Classification
• How Does 3-D Work?
• How Does the Human Eye See?
• How Does the Oyster Make a Pearl?: An Exercise in Observation
• If I Have Acid in My Stomach, Why Don't I Melt?
• In-Vitro Fertilization: What Are "Test-Tube Babies" and How Are They Made?
• Inch of Skin
• Jungle Survival: How Do People Survive in the Jungle without Food or Water?
• Making a Water Sampler
• Malaria Tracking: How Can You Locate Disease-Carrying Mosquitoes?
• Mammoth Dig
• Medical Quackeries: Can This Machine Cure Me?
• Modeling the Nervous System
• Murder Mystery: How Do Forensic Scientists Help Solve Murders?
• Mushroom Prints
• Naturally Occurring Pesticides: 7-12th grade toxicology curriculum
• Nicotine: Why Is It So Hard to Quit Smoking?
• Novocain
• Olympic Training Center: How Can Biomechanics Help an Athlete?
• Peanut Power
• Pet Food
• Photosynthesis: How Do Plants Make Food?
• Pretzel Prediction
• Prosthetic Limbs
• Proteins
• Race for the Cure: This activity simulates the extraction, identification, and separation of chemicals in or on plants using chromatography.
• Rain Forest Animals
• Reflexes
• Reflexes: Why Does a Doctor Check My Reflexes When I Have a Check-Up?
• Solar-Powered Cars
• Steroids: Do Athletes Need to Take Synthetic Steroids?
• Taste and Smell: Why Does Food Seem Tasteless When You Have a Cold?
• Tears: Why Do We Cry?
• What Are Goosebumps?
• What Does Saving Trees Have to Do with the Ozone Layer?
• Where Do Dreams Come From?
• Where Does Jell-O Really Come From?
• Why Don't Spiders Stick to Their Own Webs?
• Why Do You Need a Liver?
• Wild Lion Vets

Chemistry

• Antacid Tablet Race
• Creating a Salad Dressing
• Ethanol: How Does It Make a Car Run?
• Household Chemistry
• How Can Rain Be Acid?
• How Do We Get the Impurities Out of Drinking Water?: Making Freshwater from Seawater
• How Do You Make Bubble Stuff?
• How Do You Make Paint?
• How Do You Make Rock Candy?
• How Does Yeast Make Bread Rise?
• If I Have Acid in My Stomach, Why Don't I Melt?
• Iron Cereal
• Lemon Power
• Liquid Nitrogen Fun!
• Novocain
• Peanut Power
• Playing with Polymers
• What Is Macaroni Made Of?
• Where Does Jell-O Really Come From?

Earth Science

• Acid Rain: An Air Pollutant
• Air Pollution
• Antarctica I: Why Do Scientists Go to Antarctica?
• Antarctica II: Why Is Antarctica So Important to Our Planet?
• Avalanche Rescue: How Do Dogs Find People Buried in an Avalanche?
• The Awful 8: The Pollution Play
• Balloon Safari: How Does the Mara Ecosystem in Africa Work?
• Big Trouble in Earthquake Country
• The City from the Ooze
• Community Problem Solving
• Cratering in Your Classroom
• Digging the Earth's Crust
• Dinosaur I: Finding and Dating
• Dinosaur II: Assembling a Dinosaur
• Equator: What Is Life Like for Animals, Plants and People at the African Equator?
• Gems: How Do Gemstones Get Their Color?
• Glacier Climbing
• Glass Recycling
• Gold Mine
• Greenhouse Effect from Newton's Apple
• The Greenhouse Effect
• How Are Caves Formed?
• How Can Rain Be Acid?
• How Do We Get the Impurities Out of Drinking Water?: Making Freshwater from Seawater
• Lightning
• Making an Anemometer
• Making a Water Sampler
• The "Minimum" Solar Box Cooker
• Oil Spills: How Do You Clean Up an Oil Spill?
• The Old Windbag
• Olympic Solar Energy
• Ozone: How Do CFC's Destroy Ozone in the Earth's Atmosphere?
• Ozone Pollution
• Particulate Matter - How Dirty Is the Air We Breathe?"
• Phases of the Moon
• Rain Forest Plants
• Science Safari: Energy Resources
• A Simple Solar Water Pasteurizer
• Solar Hot Dog Cooker
• The Sun Star Solar Cooker
• Sunken Slave Ship
• Temperature Inversion
• Using Solar Energy: The Solar Baker
• Wetlands: What Are Wetlands and Why Are They So Important?
• What Are the Best Ways to Dispose of Hazardous Materials?
• What Does Saving Trees Have to Do with the Ozone Layer?
• What Is All This Ozone Stuff?
• What Is Thunder?
• What Is Wind?
• White Water Rafting
• Why Is a Diamond So Hard?
• Wilderness Training
• Wind Blow

Physical Science

• Air Bags and Collisions: How Do Airbags Prevent Automobile Injuries?
• Air Cannon
• Airfoil Experiment 1
• Air Pressure
• Air Pressure: What Is Air Pressure and How Can It Be Measured?
• Aircraft Fire Rescue: How Does a Firefighter Put Out an Airplane Fire?
• Altitude Tracking
• Antacid Tablet Race
• Balloon Staging: Rocket Staging>
• Balloons: Why Are They Stretchy?
• Balloon Vacuum
• Battery LIfe
• Bells in Your Ears
• Bernouilli Cans
• Bicycles: How Do a Bike and Its Rider Stay Up?
• Car Engines
• Circus High Wire: How Do Tightrope Walkers Keep Their Balance?
• Colored Shadows: Using Lights to Mix Colors
• Cryogenics: Science Fact or Science Fiction?
• Dancing Penny
• Demonstrating Dew and Frost
• Density Balloon
• Domed Stadiums: What Keeps Inflated Stadiums Up?
• The Dry Compass Experiment
• Energy Transfer
• Falling Test Tubes?
• Finger Boomerangs
• Fire Sandwich
• Fish Tank Optics
• Flying Tube
• Flying Wing
• Four-Wing Paper Boomerang
• Frisbee Physics: How Does Physics Play a Role in Frisbee Flying?
• Glass Blowing
• Hollywood Stunts
• How a Plane is Controlled
• How Can I Control the Soccer Ball?
• How Do Clocks Keep Time?
• How Do You Make Paper?
• How Does 3-D Work?
• Human Slingshot Ride: How Does the "Ejector Seat" Ride Work?
• Hypercoaster: How Do You Know a Roller Coaster is Safe?
• Ice Surfers: How Do They Go So Fast?
• In-Line Skating: Do In-Line Skates Really Go Faster than Roller Skates?
• Inca Engineering: How Did the Incas Build without Mortar or Wheels?
• Lemon Power
• Liquid Bottle Rocket
• Liquid Nitrogen Fun!
• Liquid Rainbow
• Locks and Dams: How Do a Lock and Dam Make a Waterway Navigable?
• Luge: How Do Engineering and Technology Play a Role in the Olympics?
• Making a Barometer
• Making a Hair Hygrometer
• Making an Air Thermometer
• Making a Straw Woodwind
• Making a Weather Vane
• Making a Wind Anemometer
• Making a Windsock
• Making a Wind Vane
• Making Paper Airplane Gliders
• Making a Steam-Powered "Rocket Boat"
• Maple-Seed Helicopters
• Match-Stick Rocket
• McEagle Styrofoam Glider
• Microwave Ovens: What Is the Science Behind Microwave Cooking?
• Mummies: How are Mummies Able to "Survive" the Tests of Time?
• Musical Tube
• Newton Car
• Nickel Karate
• Paper Rockets
• Peanut Power
• Pencil Rockets
• Ping Pong Ball Curves
• Playing with Polymers
• Potato Float
• Propeller Experiment 4
• Propeller Experiment 5
• Riverboats: How Does Steam Power Big Machinery
• Robots
• Rock Climbing: How Can the Human Body Stick to a Sheer Cliff?
• Rocket Car
• Rocket Pinwheel
• Science Safari: Energy Resources
• Scuba Diving
• Sewer Science: Where Does Sewage Go?
• Singing Rod
• Ski Jumping: How Do Ski Jumpers Go So Far?
• Slinky Physics: How Do Toys Work?
• Soda Pop Can Hero Engine
• Splitting Water: H₂O Hydrolysis
• Static Charged 2x4s
• Telecommunications: New Frontiers in Electronic Communications
• T.P. Away
• Using Bubbles to Learn about Light Interference
• Waterskiing: How Do Water Skis Stay Up?
• The Wet Compass Experiment
• What Are Optical Illusions?
• What Is Infrared Light and How Does It Work?
• What Is Macaroni Made Of?
• What Makes the World Turn Around?
• Why Do I Hear Weird Sounds at Night?
• Why Does a Car Horn Sound Different When It Passes By?
• Why Does a Steel Nail Sink While a Steel Boat Floats?
• Wooden Helicopter

Technology

• Airfoil Experiment
• Archery: How Has Technology Changed the Bow and Arrow over the Centuries?
• Battery LIfe
• Car Engines
• Demonstrating Dew and Frost
• Domed Stadiums: What Keeps Inflated Stadiums Up?
• The Dry Compass Experiment
• Electric Cars
• Ergonomics: What Is It and Why Is It Important?
• How a Plane is Controlled
• How Do the Bar-codes at the Grocery Store Work?
• How Do CD's Work?
• How Do Clocks Keep Time?
• How TV Works
• In-Line Skating: Do In-Line Skates Really Go Faster than Roller Skates?
• Jumbo Jets: How Do they Get off the Ground?
• Make Your Own Burglar Alarm
• Making An Anemometer
• Making a Barometer
• Making a Hair Hygrometer
• Making an Air Thermometer
• Making a Weather Vane
• Making a Wind Anemometer
• Making a Windsock
• Making a Wind Vane
• Making Paper Airplane Gliders
• Making a Steam-Powered "Rocket Boat"
• Maya Bike Trek: How Can Technology Help You Take a Bike Trip through Central America?
• Medical Quackeries: Can This Machine Cure Me?
• The "Minimum" Solar Box Cooker
• Omnimax: How is a Giant Screen Movie Made and Projected?
• Propeller Experiment 4
• Propeller Experiment 5
• Robots
• Satellite Technology: What Will Future Satellite Technology Bring?
• Science Safari: Art & Music
• A Simple Solar Water Pasteurizer
• Simulator Rides: How Are Amusement Park Rides Designed to Create Illusions?
• Solar Hot Dog Cooker
• Splitting Water: H₂O Hydrolysis
• The Sun Star Cooker
• Taking Apart Electrical Appliances
• Traffic Control: How Can Technology Help Alleviate Traffic Jams?
• Web Training: Learning to Use the Internet
• The Wet Compass Experiment
• What Is All This Ozone Stuff?
• Why Does My Voice Sound Different on a Tape Recorder?
• Why Does the TV Go Crazy When the Mixer Is On?