ORC Resource Types

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The objective of this promising practice lesson is to design and construct a boat that takes into account factors such as buoyancy, the properties of materials, and design constraints. Students design and construct a boat out of aluminum foil and a few other simple materials....

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this promising practice lesson is to explore the molecular structure of matter and how it can affect the physical characteristics of a specific material. Students use Internet resources to compare the structure of diamonds and graphite....

Projects: COR, Standards First

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this lesson is to show students that many kinds of living things can be sorted into groups in many ways using various features to decide which things belong to which group and that classification schemes will vary with purpose. (author)

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The goals of this promising practice lesson are to: a) expand students' knowledge of living organisms and further develop their ability to group, or classify, living organisms according to a variety of common features, and b) introduce students to scientific groupings of organisms. In this lesson, students will get acquainted with diverse forms of...

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this promising practice lesson is to explore the factors that contribute to the collapse of a society; to learn how archaeological evidence is gathered and interpreted. Students find out about the social changes that caused the collapse of important ancient civilizations in Central America, Mesopotamia, the southwestern United States, and western Africa....

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this promising practice lesson is to develop an understanding of communication technologies; and to appreciate the opportunities and problems that come with these technologies. Students explore Internet sites that illustrate the history of various electronic technologies and demonstrate future technological innovations....

Projects: Standards First

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this promising practice lesson is to introduce students to energy through the idea of energy transformations and conversions, and to develop students' ideas of what energy is and how it can be measured. This investigation could be the beginning of a unit on energy....

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The purpose of this promising practice lesson is to help students understand what the knowledge of DNA can tell us about ourselves and other organisms and species. Students will also learn about the systematic study of the human genome....

Projects: Standards First

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: This promising practice lesson is the first of a two-part series on where food comes from. These lessons are intended to help students understand that most of the food they eat comes from farms....

Discipline: Science

Professional Commentary: The objective of this promising practice lesson is to familiarize students with the kinds of things that plants need to grow well. This is the second lesson of a two-part series on where food comes from....