One video clip, with embedded graphs, can be used to help students understand the mathematical relationships that describe simple harmonic motion.
This exercise contains two interrelated modules that introduce students to modern biological techniques in the area of Bioinformatics, which is the application of computer technology to the management of biological information. The need for Bioinformatics has arisen from the recent explosion of publicly available genomic information, such as that resulting from the Human Genome Project.
While the heyday of the canals lasted only a few decades, they transformed the American economy by connecting the areas west of the Appalachian Mountains to eastern population centers and Atlantic ports. Concentrated largely north of the Mason-Dixon line, they shaped American regionalism too by linking the northeast and northwest together into a region that increasingly came to see itself as the "North."
The Coke vs. Pepsi Taste Test Challenge has students design and carry out an experiment to determine whether or not students are able to correctly identify two brands of cola in a blind taste test. In the first stage of the activity students design and conduct the experiment. In the second part of the activity students use Sampling SIM software (freely downloadable from http://www.tc.umn.edu/~delma001/stat_tools/) to simulate and gather information on what would be expected under chance conditions (i.e., if students obtained correct answers only by guessing). The students then compare the observed results to the chance results and make an inference about whether a given student can in fact correctly identify Coke and Pepsi in a blind taste test. Finally, the experiment is critiqued in terms of how well it met the standards for a good experiment. This activity allows students to gain a better understanding of the experimental process and causality through considering control, random assignment, and possible confounding variables. The activity also allows students to begin to understand the process of hypothesis testing by comparing their observed results of the taste test to the results obtained through Sampling SIM (which model would be obtained by chance). Students make an inference about whether particular students in their class can truly tell the difference between Coke and Pepsi by reasoning about how surprising the observed results are compared to the simulated distribution of correct identifications by guessing. The activity also provides an opportunity for discussing generalizability to a population.
Carbon calculators, no matter how well intended as tools to help measure energy footprints, tend to be black boxes and can produce wildly different results, depending on the calculations used to weigh various energy factors. By comparing different calculators, learners can analyze which ones are the most accurate and relevant, and which are the most transparent.
Students analyze video clips of kids rolling down a hill on skates, scooters, and bikes to determine whether mechanical energy is conserved.
A high speed video clip of a roller coaster is used as an example of conservation of mechanical energy. Students use the video to determine whether mechanical energy is conserved while the roller coaster rolls up, and then back down a hil.
This activity is designed to teach students how cladistics can be used as a tool to analyze evolutionary change and relationships among organisms. Sheets contained here should be copied and then modified as the instructor sees fit. Fasteners, rather than fossils, are used as the specimens.
The most democratic body in the federal government, hundreds of representatives for the House are elected every other year. This site maps elections from before the Civil War until today showing changing patterns across regions and between urban and rural areas.
For this experiment, students use a DC motor as a generator and various shaped turbine designs to test which design produces the most electrical power. Using a fan to generate the "wind", students attach different blades made of folded paper or card stock to the motor to see how much power is generated.
ELL students create and share a botanic field guide incorporating depiction, measurement, description, and classification of common Minnesota trees, shrubs, wildflowers, and plants.
An activity designed to enable the students to access the impact of oil-development on environmentin Alaska. Students will draw conclusion based on various data and reading various views.
In this computer lab, students use satellite imagery, daylength information, and phytoplankton physiology models to calculate annual primary production for an assigned ocean region.Satellite data is obtained from the NASA Earth Observation website. Students use the analysis tool to determine chlorophyll concentration and sea surface temperature. They also receive a day-length calculator and are asked to model light transmission through the water column. Using step-by-step instructions and proviede equations relating phytoplankton physiology to irradiance and temperature students calculate carbon uptake at discreet locations in the water column. The second half of the exercise involves scaling up to the entire water column, region, and season. Students present their work to the class and evaluate their result using scientific literature. Differences between regions are then discussed by the class.
No sitting American president traveled outside the country before Theodore Roosevelt traveled to Panama in 1906 to see the construction of the Panama Canal. A century later Air Force One regularly carries the head of the executive branch to all corners of the world. The Executive Abroad maps the international trips of presidents and secretaries of state.
The decades between the banning of the international slave trade in 1808 and the abolition of slavery during the Civil War saw the massive and harrowing relocation of approximately 850,000 enslaved men, women, and children. While some enslaved people were moved when their owners relocated to the western frontier, about two-thirds were bought and sold in America’s slave market. They were forcibly uprooted from their homes, separated from their loved ones, and marched and shipped across the South on railroads and steamships.
At all points in its history, a significant proportion of the population of the United States had been born in other countries and regions. This being the case, American history can never be understood by just looking within its borders. The culture and politics of the US have always been profoundly shaped by the material and emotional ties many of its residents have had to the places where they were born. This map will allow you to begin to explore those connections at the basic level of demographic statistics.
Students will discover their personal political leanings through a website and express their opinion on their perceived accuracy of those findings
Students will analyze data from the "State of the Bay" reports from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation while reviewing and completing the scientific method. The final assessment is a mission for students to create a persuasive speech or advertisement that will call for action to make changes that will positively impact the watershed with reasons why change is important.
In this activity, students are split into groups and assigned different ocean regions. These include the Arabian Sea, Equatorial Pacific, North Atantic, and Southern Ocean. Each group uses Google Earth to view NASA satellite chlorophyll imagery and the cruise track of data collected as part of the U.S. Joint Global Ocean Flux Study. At three locations along each cruise track, chlorophyll-temperature-depth (CTD) and bottle data collected as part of the study can be downloaded. Students work with the data to identify oceanographic features as a function of depth and then make simple calculations.
Students analyze data on temperature and precipitation collected from 26 different Long Term Ecological Research sites and compare them with annual net primary productivity. The students then form an ecological rule to explain their results.