This experiment will help students to understand the role of plants in filtering the water moving through a watershed. Students will discover that soil and plants have something of a dual role in this process and, depending on whether materials are dissolved or suspended in the water, soils and plant roots can remove some or all of this material as the water moves down through soil. They also learn ... Full description.

In this internet activity, students use search engines to build a list of facts about Earth science that fascinate them. After building the list, students will choose and rank their top ten amazing facts and answer some questions about them. Full description.

Facts on this site about Uranus include mean distance from Sun, length of year, rotation period, mean orbital velocity, inclination of axis, average temperature (day and night), diameter, and number of observed satellites. Uranus' axis of rotation is tilted nearly 98 degrees, almost perpendicular to its orbit. Consequently, the seasons and days on Uranus are strange. At times, the north pole points ... Full description.

Information on this site about the planet Pluto includes mean distance from the Sun, length of a year, rotation period, mean orbital velocity, inclination of axis, temperature, diameter, and number of observed satellites. The unusual inclination from the plane of the ecliptic and eccentricity of the orbit of Pluto is discussed and diagramed. The composition of Pluto and Charon are discussed, as is ... Full description.

This lesson plan is designed to introduce students to the concept of pollution prevention (P2). Instead of trying to clean up pollution after it has been created, P2 focuses on reducing the generation of pollution and waste by changing or modifying plans, practices, or habits. P2 also includes activities that protect natural resources through conservation or more efficient resource use. Pollution ... Full description.

This activity helps students understand why compass angles need to be corrected for regional magnetic variation. The magnetic compass, perfected slowly over years of experimentation, trial, and scientific endeavor, became the sailor's most common and most reliable direction-indicating aid, but is influenced by magnetic variabilities and the location of magnetic north. Terms introduced include compass, ... Full description.

Through this activity, students will gain an understanding of how scientists use instruments to collect and measure information, and understand how instruments can be adapted to collect information about items in space that cannot always be seen. They will construct a model to collect information (sunlight, in this case) and use it as an example to see how the Neutral Atom Imager aboard the IMAGE ... Full description.

In this lab, students will learn how to take field notes as scientists do, using a simulated sediment core, constructed with edible items. Students will use metric notations to mark changes in the sediments, objects such as fossils and glacial pebbles in the core sample, and will select a spot to sample. They will use a small round cookie cutter to obtain a cylindrical sample of the core. The activity ... Full description.

In this activity students learn the importance of petroleum products by considering what it would be like to live in a world without them. After the teacher reviews some uses of petroleum as well as some problems caused by the use of petroleum, students study a worksheet that includes pictures of two houses. The houses are identical except everything made with petroleum has been taken out of the second ... Full description.

On this website you will find links to current, forecast, and archived weather for use at home and in the classroom. In addition, there are more than fifty online examples demonstrating severe weather phenomena and the mechanisms for their formation. Links to photo galleries, animations, and demonstration applets on all topics of severe weather can be found in the left menu of each page. The severe ... Full description.