Students gain a deeper understanding of how sound sensors work through a hands-on design challenge involving LEGO MINDSTORMS(TM) NXT taskbots and sound sensors. Student groups each program a robot computer to use to the sound of hand claps to control the robot's movement. They learn programming skills and logic design in parallel. They experience how robots can take sensor input and use it to make decisions to move and turn, similar to the human sense of hearing. A PowerPoint® presentation and pre/post quizzes are provided.

In this activity, students use a variety of materials to design and create headphones that absorb sound.

Students teams design and build shoe prototypes that convert between high heels and athletic shoes. They apply their knowledge about the mechanics of walking and running as well as shoe design (as learned in the associated lesson) to design a multifunctional shoe that is both fashionable and functional.

Students learn about using renewable energy from the Sun for heating and cooking as they build and compare the performance of four solar cooker designs. They explore the concepts of insulation, reflection, absorption, conduction and convection.

Student groups are given a set of materials: cardboard, insulating materials, aluminum foil and Plexiglas, and challenged to build solar ovens. The ovens must collect and store as much of the sun's energy as possible. Students experiment with heat transfer through conduction by how well the oven is insulated and radiation by how well it absorbs solar radiation. They test the effectiveness of their designs qualitatively by baking something and quantitatively by taking periodic temperature measurements and plotting temperature vs. time graphs. To conclude, students think like engineers and analyze the solar oven's strengths and weaknesses compared to conventional ovens.

Students learn the meaning of preservation and conservation and identify themselves and others as preservationists or conservationists in relation to specific environmental issues. They use Venn diagrams to clarify the similarities and differences in viewpoints. They see how an environmental point-of-view affects the approach to an engineering problem.

A brief refresher on the Cartesian plane includes how points are written in (x, y) format and oriented to the axes, and which directions are positive and negative. Then students learn about what it means for a relation to be a function and how to determine domain and range of a set of data points.

This lesson introduces students to the idea of biomimicry or looking to nature for engineering ideas. Biomimicry involves solving human problems by mimicking natural solutions, and it works well because the solutions exist naturally. There are numerous examples of useful applications of biomimicry, and in this lesson we look at a few fun examples.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"A group of scientists collaborating across the US has developed a new tool to help understand eye diseases: cornea organoids, miniaturized corneas that can be grown in the lab using human stem cells. The cornea forms the outermost surface of the eye, and many disorders affecting eyesight arise from defects in this tissue, including some inherited forms of blindness. Traditional cell culture experiments have fallen short when trying to study these conditions because they don’t adequately capture the complex arrangement of cells and extracellular matrix found in the cornea. But organoids do, opening the door for new discoveries that could change how we treat eye disorders. To create this 3D model system, the researchers started with human stem cells to capture the earliest stages of development. By adding specific factors to the culture medium, the scientists were able to direct the cells into becoming cornea cells..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

In this activity, students examine how to grow plants the most efficiently. They imagine that they are designing a biofuels production facility and need to know how to efficiently grow plants to use in this facility. As a means of solving this design problem, they plan a scientific experiment in which they investigate how a given variable (of their choice) affects plant growth. They then make predictions about the outcomes and record their observations after two weeks regarding the condition of the plants' stem, leaves and roots. They use these observations to guide their solution to the engineering design problem. The biological processes of photosynthesis and transpiration are briefly explained to help students make informed decisions about planning and interpreting their investigation and its results.

Students write poems using rhyme and meter as they come to understand the mechanical concept of rhythm, based on the principle of oscillation, in a broader biological and cultural context, as seen in dance and sports, poetry and other literary forms, and communication in general. Note: The literacy activities for the Mechanics unit are based on physical themes that have broad application to our experience in the world — concepts of rhythm, balance, spin, gravity, levity, inertia, momentum, friction, stress and tension.

Students learn about the many types of expenses associated with building a bridge. Working like engineers, they estimate the cost for materials for a bridge member of varying sizes. After making calculations, they graph their results to compare how costs change depending on the use of different materials (steel vs. concrete). They conclude by creating a proposal for a city bridge design based on their findings.

Students design a simple behavioral survey, and learn basic protocol for primary research, survey design and report writing. Note: The literacy activities for the Mechanics unit are based on physical themes that have broad application to our experience in the world — concepts of rhythm, balance, spin, gravity, levity, inertia, momentum, friction, stress and tension.

The students discover the basics of heat transfer in this activity by constructing a constant pressure calorimeter to determine the heat of solution of potassium chloride in water. They first predict the amount of heat consumed by the reaction using analytical techniques. Then they calculate the specific heat of water using tabulated data, and use this information to predict the temperature change. Next, the students will design and build a calorimeter and then determine its specific heat. After determining the predicted heat lost to the device, students will test the heat of solution. The heat given off by the reaction can be calculated from the change in temperature of the water using an equation of heat transfer. They will compare this with the value they predicted with their calculations, and then finish by discussing the error and its sources, and identifying how to improve their design to minimize these errors.

Why study Quantitative Literacy?

Most students sign up for this course to fulfill a general education mathematics requirement. And this text is certainly aimed at that general audience. But by the time the course is completed, the authors hope that you will have developed some appreciation for the usefulness and elegance of the subject. Without doubt, some level of competency and comfort in working with numerical data is needed to navigate the modern world; and we have tried to cover topics that can be used in day to day life.

In this book, we will focus on problem solving and critical thinking skills. Our goal is not to prepare you just for the next math class, but to equip you with the necessary tools so that you can apply basic mathematical reasoning to a wide variety of commonly encountered problems. Along the way, we will learn basic logic, how to work with percentages and units, the basics of consumer finance, and how to use and interpret basic statistical data.

Cranial nerves are those nerves which arise from the brain and brain stem rather than the spinal cord. Nerves arising from the spinal cord are the peripheral nerves. There are 12 pairs of cranial nerves and these pairs of nerves passage through foramina in the skull, either individually or in groups. Cranial nerves are traditionally referred to by Roman numerals and these numerals begin cranially and run caudally.

Students learn about the physical force of linear momentum movement in a straight line by investigating collisions. They learn an equation that engineers use to describe momentum. Students also investigate the psychological phenomenon of momentum; they see how the "big mo" of the bandwagon effect contributes to the development of fads and manias, and how modern technology and mass media accelerate and intensify the effect.

Let's explore some science and math around why seatbelts work. Check out the career video from Billie Jo Deal, Transportation Safety Coordinator from the Oregon Department of Transportation, about how she works to keep people safe on the roads. Then, in the Discovery Challenge, we build crash models and calculate restraining forces.

This lesson introduces NGSS standards, and those standards are listed in the lesson.

Videos are part of the Explore Science Club series, an asynchronous online learning program using YouTube videos that connects elementary and middle school students to STEM professionals through hands-on lessons where students explore science and engineering practices related to the highlighted careers. There is an option to use FlipGrid, an online video recording platform for students to share their discoveries

More info: www.go-stem.org

In this lesson, students find their location on a map using Latitude and Longitudinal coordinates. They determine where they should go to be rescued and how best to get there.