Popular Science $5000 Lesson Plan Contest

Innovative Science Lesson

Scientific literacy is important for post-secondary education, STEM careers, and contributing members of a democratic society. Students are encouraged to develop content knowledge and skills necessary to inquire about the natural and human-made worlds. Inquiry skills allowing them to search out, describe, and explain natural phenomena and design artifacts. Scientific inquiry, experimentation, and design involve practice (skills) in direct relationship to knowledge:

• Formulate a testable hypothesis.
• Design and conduct an experiment specifying variables to be changed, controlled, and measured.
• Select appropriate tools and technology (e.g., calculators, computers, thermometers, meter sticks,balances, graduated cylinders, and microscopes), and make quantitative observations.
• Present and explain data and findings using multiple representations, including tables, graphs,mathematical and physical models, and demonstrations.
• Draw conclusions based on data or evidence presented in tables or graphs, and make inferencesbased on patterns or trends in the data.
• Communicate procedures and results using appropriate science and technology terminology.
• Offer explanations of procedures, and critique and revise them.

Award

Popular Science is awarding $5000 for the best original Lesson Plan (Grades 6-8) in each of the following categories:

• Biomimetic Design – naturally occurring phenomenon (e.g. motion of fish fins, the resilience of wood, the human gait)
• Climate Change – nature of climate change (e.g. how it happens, how irreversible it may be, or how unforeseen consequences arise from otherwise innocuous-seeming shifts in climate)
• Fuel Cells – the basic function and future potential of fuel cells (e.g. explaining their chemical basis, their basic premise, or how they function within a larger mechanism)
• Polymers – nature of new materials (e.g. demonstrating how repeated structural units can be assembled to create a useful macromolecule)
• “Big Data” Analysis – sociological analysis and hard statistics to provide useful and surprising interpretations of large amounts of data (e.g. provide a data set or point to examples that are publicly available)

Top lessons may be featured in Popular Science Magazine and/or in special publications it produces and distributes.

Technical Requirements

• teachable in one to three 50 minute sessions
• must include a “hands on” activity (can include some educator demonstration activities)
• cost less than $50 using readily available materials
• class size of 20 students
• appropriate for grade 6-8 science
• include some of the standards in the attached documents

Submission Deadline: October 31, 2011

Click the link for more details.