This toolkit was designed to help presenters - particularly scientists and engineers - easily present to elementary and middle school audiences and feel confident that the information they are presenting is developmentally-appropriate. The site... (View More) includes PowerPoint presentations on Earth's water cycle, with talking points and suggestions. Best practices are also included for elementary and middle school presentations that provide helpful suggestions before, during, and after the presentation, as well as a list of additional resources. (View Less)

In this activity, participants learn about the atmosphere by making observations and taking measurements. They will go outside and use scientific equipment to collect atmospheric moisture data (temperature, relative humidity, precipitation and cloud... (View More) cover). Students will use this qualitative and quantitative data to understand how water is found in the atmosphere, how the atmosphere determines weather and climate, and how Earth’s spheres are connected through the water cycle. The data collection is based on protocols from the GLOBE program. This activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)

This resource is designed to enable presenters (scientists, engineers, etc.) to easily present to an elementary and/or middle school audience and feel confident that the information they are presenting is developmentally appropriate and supports the... (View More) Next Generation Science Standards. A PowerPoint Presentation includes talking points and suggestions, a “Best Practices” document to offer helpful suggestion before, during, and after the presentation, and a list of additional resources that may be accessed by the speaker and/or the educator. This presentation is designed to take 30 to 45 minutes. (View Less)

In this activity, participants learn about the geosphere by making observations and taking measurements. They will go outside and use scientific equipment to investigate water in the soil by measuring soil moisture, temperature, color and... (View More) consistency. Students will use this qualitative and quantitative data to understand how water is found in many places in the natural environment and how these places are connected in the water cycle. The data collection is based on protocols from the GLOBE program. This activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)

This activity is a short engineering design challenge to be completed by individual students or small teams. A real-world problem is presented, designing buildings for hurricane-prone areas, but in a simulated way that works in a classroom, after... (View More) school club, or informal education setting. Students are given simple materials and design requirements, and must plan and build a tower as tall as possible that will hold up a tennis ball while resisting the force of wind from a fan. After the towers are built, the group comes together to test them. If there is time after testing, which can be observational or framed as a contest between teams, students can redesign their towers to improve their performance, or simply discuss what worked well and what didn’t in their designs. (View Less)

In this activity, students face an engineering challenge based on real-world applications. They are tasked with developing a tool they can use to measure the amount of rain that falls each day. Students will find out why freshwater is important,... (View More) learn about the water cycle, and the need to have a standard form of calibration for measurement tools. They will learn that keeping track of precipitation is important, and learn a little bit about how NASA's GPM satellite measures precipitation from space. This lesson uses the 5-E instructional model. (View Less)

This lesson was developed to give participants an understanding of Earth's water cycle. In this one-hour long activity, students participate in a webquest to learn about the water cycle, and then build a mini-model of the water cycle to observe how... (View More) water moves through Earth's four systems. The activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)

Water is essential to Earth's living system, the biosphere. In this lesson, students determine the types of living things within an outdoor study site, use a taxonomic key to determine the predominant land cover type of their site, then predict the... (View More) amount of water present. Data collection is based on protocols from the GLOBE program. This activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)

In this activity, participants learn about the hydrosphere by making observations and taking measurements. They will go outside and use scientific equipment to investigate temperature, pH and transparency of a body of water. They will use this... (View More) qualitative and quantitative data to understand why it is important to know about the condition of freshwater sources in many places in the natural environment and how these places are connected in the water cycle. Data collection is based on protocols from The GLOBE Program. This activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)

This activity was developed to get students thinking about the many ways that people use freshwater and how we can conserve this precious and fundamental natural resource. Students will watch a short documentary describing issues related to clean... (View More) water availability, analyze water-use data and start to think about how they consume and can conserve water. This background knowledge will lead to students collecting data about their own water use and finding areas in their lives to conserve water. This activity uses the 5E instructional model and is part of the "Survivor Earth" series of one-hour lessons. (View Less)