Conflict resolution: Raising an issue
The way we raise an issue has a significant effect on the entire problem-solving process. By raising an issue in a constructive way, we set the stage early for resolving the conflict productively. The purpose of this unit is to give participants an opportunity to practice and explore this type of problem solving.
Elementary GLOBE: Earth System Play
The class will brainstorm, write, create, and produce a play in which they represent how all the Earth systems are interconnected. This play can be based on the Elementary GLOBE book "All About Earth: Our World on Stage" or on other student-generated topics representing interconnections of the Earth systems. The purpose of the play is to serve as a performance assessment providing students with the opportunity to display what they have learned about the Earth as a system in a creative manner. Th
Elementary GLOBE: We're All Connected
A learning activity for the "All About Earth: Our World on Stage" book in the Elementary GLOBE series. One of the "big ideas" in Earth system science is the notion of interaction among parts of the Earth system. In the Elementary GLOBE book All About Earth: Our World on Stage, the children in Ms. Patel's class discuss instances of how the four major spheres of Earth's system interact. They symbolize these interactions by using large arrows to link the system components: air, water, soil, living
Elementary GLOBE: Earth System in a Bottle
A learning activity for the "All About Earth: Our World on Stage" book in the Elementary GLOBE series. In pairs, students will create experimental conditions in terrariums in order to study what plants need to live. Variables to study include the presence or absence of soil, water, and sunlight. Students will record the growth of radish plants as well as observations of "the water cycle" in their terrariums. At the conclusion of their experiments, students will share their results with the class
From Godzilla to the Ring: An Overview of Japanese Film
The unit is a gentle, eclectic introduction to Japanese film. It also draws some comparisons between US films and Japanese films. Students examine US and Japanese film from multiple perspectives. The unit features readings, presentations, and interactive activities. For the culminating project, each student creates a simple website on a Japanese movie that he or she has chosen to watch.
Radiology Lab 2: Cardiovascular
Introduction to concepts important in cardiovascular imaging of normal anatomy, including angiographic techniques and cross-sectional methods.
Active Transport in Insect Malpighian Tubules
The Malpighian tubules of insects are an excellent model for examining the properties of secretion in a transporting epithelium. In this exercise students expose tubules from cockroaches or crickets to chlorophenol red and visually estimate the dye concentration in the lumen. By adding metabolic inhibitors and competitors or by substituting ion-free media they can demonstrate competition, specificity, and energy- or ion-dependence of active transport. Advanced students can design their own exper
A Novel Method to Archive Plant Material for DNA Analysis
In this exercise, students isolate and analyze DNA from food plants in a supermarket, or from common backyard plants. Extracting plant DNA is often difficult using conventional means because undesirable material including PCR inhibitors often co-purifies with the DNA. The novel approach used in this exercise is simple and quick, and also avoids the use of dangerous organic reagents. Students crush plant material (spinach leaves in this exercise) onto special cards originally used to archive bloo
Practicing Elaboration in a Problem/Solution Essay
One theory suggests that students tend to list in an essay because they lack the tools to elaborate. Because they do not have the strategies, they attempt to fill up the empty space by introducing new primary ideas instead of fleshing out the ideas they have already presented. This activity attempts to make students aware of the need to elaborate and to provide students with some workable strategies for elaborating. Using a PowerPoint presentation, the teacher demonstrates the necessity for elab
Developing continuous air during articulation
Combining long tones and burst-tonguing will assist many beginning instrument players to eliminate excessive breaths while articulating.
"It Was Considered Low Music": Pianist Eubie Blake on the Birth of Ragtime at the Turn of the Centur
Ragtime music, with its syncopated, polyrhythmic style, was born, according to cultural historian Robert Snyder, in the 1890s in the black saloons and brothels of southern and Midwestern cities like Baltimore and St. Louis. By the end of the 19th century ragtime had assumed a place at the center of American popular music and remained there until the 1920s. Ragtime meant a tinkling piano and no one played the ragtime piano any better or longer than Eubie Blake, born in Baltimore in 1887. In this
"Cast Down Your Bucket Where You Are": Booker T. Washington's Atlanta Compromise Speech
In 1895, Booker T. Washington gave what later came to be known as the Atlanta Compromise speech before the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta. His address was one of the most important and influential speeches in American history, guiding African-American resistance to white discrimination and establishing Washington as one of the leading black spokesmen in America. Washington's speech stressed accommodation rather than resistance to the racist order under which Southern Afric
"We Did Not Have Enough Money": George Miller's Testimony about the 1919 Steel Strike
In the dramatic 1919 steel strike, 350,000 workers walked off their jobs and crippled the industry. The U.S. Senate Committee on Education and Labor set out to investigate the strike while it was still in progress. In his testimony before the committee, Clairton worker George Miller called the 1919 strike a quest for "a standard American living"--a phrase that was particularly meaningful to the Serbian-born Miller.
Transnational Pollution: Why Are You Dumping on Me?
This lesson familiarizes students with the different types of transnational pollution, and gives them an opportunity to role-play in a hypothetical case of transnational pollution involving the Danube River. The major goal of this activity is to show students that an incident in one nation may well have serious environmental consequences for other nations. Additionally, it will give students an opportunity to role-play complex roles that are meaningful and consequential to global concerns. The l
Research Outdoorsmanship Homepage
This website provides information about field trips. The site was written specifically for those participating is field research but information applies to wilderness camping and classroom field trips. The site 'aims to pass on some knowledge and skills necessary for the practice of safe field research by focusing on outdoorsmanship as it relates to outdoor research.'
Phases of the Moon
This site contains a series of visualizations of the sun, moon and Earth System and how they relate to the changing face of the moon. Animations are in the form of Java applets, forms for field observation of the moon, and a collection of exercises and PDF versions of background material. There are practice questions and quizzes that discuss the animations.
Oceans of Kansas
Oceans of Kansas is the unofficial, but highly useful, web page of the Sternberg Museum of Natural History. To find content, scroll to the middle of the page. The website contains information on exhibits, articles with photographs of fossils and paintings about marine reptiles and fish who flourished in the Western Interior Sea. The site also contains an online collection of full-text paleontology papers, and a links page.
Microbiology On-line
Microbiology Online is joint project of Society for General Microbiology (SGM) and the Microbiology in Schools Advisory Committee (MISAC) to provide support for microbiology education. The project provides teaching resources from SGM and MISAC, advice for teaching microbiology, information on teaching practical microbiology and low-cost training for teachers. Users can follow links to information on why we study microbiology, microbiology safety, facts and FAQ's and additional links.
Using Investigative Cases in Geoscience
This website provides an overview of using investigative cases as teaching tools in geoscience. The site is part of the Starting Point: Teaching Entry Level Geoscience project. Information includes a description of how cases serve as springboards to student-designed investigations and how cases engage students and faculty in collaborative problem posing, problem solving, and persuasion.
Swampeast Missouri
In this Starting Point case study, students will explore wetland hydrology and biology. They will decide whether or not to restore a wetland or retain dams and drainage systems. Students will also examine the complexity of decisions regarding wetland restoration as well as investigate viewpoints of various stakeholders in the draining of wetlands. While the activity is set in Missouri, the case can apply to any wetland conservation or restoration project. Users can access information regarding l
