For this assignment, students will create and plan an island. They will consider various aspects of their civilization such as mapping, religion, culture, folklore, art, music, dance, agriculture, industry, government, and law and order. This assignment culminates in an oral presentation of the students’ island which should include artifacts, maps, musical compositions etc. This project meets curriculum outcomes in grade 9 Social Studies, ELA and Arts Education.

You are preparing your family’s emergency kits in case there is a need to leave your home quickly, or stay in your home without electricity or water. You need to be able to create an emergency supply kit that includes a lightweight water filtration device that is low cost. This will provide you with clean water regardless of your water source.

In this project, you will gain knowledge of natural disaster preparedness through the Red Cross Pillowcase project. You will research and experiment with the water cycle to learn how water is naturally filtered. You will then design and build a water filtration device that could filter water in an emergency situation.

What if students could see the relevance of their school curriculum to real-world, interesting, STEM-related careers? Let's help them create a great future!

By signing up with your email address and clicking the yellow subscribe button, you will receive this great design thinking project that your students will love! It is part of a design thinking toolkit and includes a free design thinking project, an eBook, and a suite of assessments. You will also receive a weekly email with free, members-only access to the latest blog posts, videos, podcasts and resources to help you boost creativity and spark innovation in your classroom.

I wanted to give my grade 9 students the opportunity to show me how they interpret and understand the periodic table. I wanted to come up with a creative and fun way for them to display their knowledge. I attended an amazing session at FETC in Orlando called “Storytelling For The Youtube Generation” that showcased the many opportunities to use popular youtube videos as educational tools (Check out Steve Dembo for more information - he has some great prezis). So I decided to give my students the opportunity to teach me about the periodic table as if I had no prior knowledge by creating videos based off of viral videos.

In our unit on forces and simple machines we incorporated
many different uses of technology. During our unit the students were
given an opportunity to work collaboratively and think critically. After
learning all about simple machine and forces, my class had to
collaboratively design a fair test that would explore one of type of force.
Each group created a fair a test and designed and collected materials to
carry out this experiment. They also had to create a tool to record their
results. During their experiment we had 3 adults with iPads who walked
around the room videoing as the students explained their findings. This
allowed us to check their understanding at this point.
Some ways we used technology throughout this unit
- Used as an instructional tool
- Students used to share their results
- Shared results through pictures and videos
- Present Data
- Generate class discussions
- Final Assessment (students created a PowerPoint)

The AI Family Challenge is a free, hands-on AI education program that brings families, schools, communities, and technology know-it-alls together to give everyone the chance to learn, play and create with AI.

From classroom management, to project ideas, to script writing and planning, the resources in these guides will help you implement creativity with technology across your curriculum.

The guides give strategies for implementing creative technology in: primary literacy, elementary literacy, elementary math, science, STEM, elementary social studies, digital story telling and English language skills.

As a part of our school SWISI program, we work on math skills during our assigned time. For this activity students will be scanning QR codes that align with the unit they are working on in math at the time.

Students will be able to identify healthy dairy products, describe the dairy process, and strengthen writing and sequencing skills.

Use the slippery sidewalks as inspiration to try this practical activity! Students work collaboratively to design and build a non-slip boot tread that uses friction to prevent slipping on an incline.

All materials are listed and provided including assessment and supporting media.

Here is an interview I did with an elementary student who used the design thinking process at home. He prototyped and developed a product to sell for "Market Day." According to his mother, they redesigned, remade, re-shopped, and then redesigned again. For the Ideate portion of the process, they used the Internet to generate ideas, and then went to buy supplies to prototype their product. I interviewed the student to get a glimpse of what he experienced during the learning process.

In this unit, students learned about the external parts of different animals that help them meet their needs and survive in their specific environment. These parts help animals see, hear, grasp objects, protect themselves, and move from place to place. Their parts also help them seek, find, and take in food, water and air. The goal of the unit was for students to design and create the “ultimate” animal that can survive in any environment. They used the design thinking process to develop a problem sentence, find a solution to the problem, and prototype their solution. The process involved students asking questions, making observations and gathering information on external animal parts. They used their findings to sketch out possible solutions to their problem sentence. Finally the students created their ultimate animal and proposed their solution to a “zookeeper.”

Special thanks to Nalisha Keshaw, Brianna Bedessem, Ara Cho, and Chris Bernhardi, and the whole 1C class for making this unit possible!

The Issue: How should the land around water systems be used?
Imagine you live in a town near a lake in Saskatchewan. For drinking water, the town uses
ground water from a local well. The ground water comes from an aquifer that sits below land
that is being developed for a feedlot.

Classification: DL6.2 Examine how humans organize understanding of the diversity of living things.
Characteristics and Behaviours: DL6.3 Analyze the characteristics and behaviours of vertebrates (i.e., mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish) and invertebrates.
Adaptations: DL6.4 Examine and describe structures and behaviours that help individual living organisms survive in their environments in the short term and species of living organisms adapt to their environments in the long term.

This Super Lesson utilizes Project Based Learning to assist learners with designing, building, and testing flying contraptions as an introduction to Engineering. The goal of this project is to engage students in collaborative team work and to introduce students to the Science and Engineering Practices: Asking Questions and Defining Problems, Planning and Carrying Out Investigations, and Constructing Explanations and Designing Solutions.

We have offered this Super Lesson as an 8-week elective course, developing and strengthening student interest in applied Math and Science topics. It could also be offered within upper elementary or middle school Science and Math courses. In addition, each week’s topic could be used as a stand alone mini-lesson if time is limited. We have worked to include multiple options within this unit to make it accessible to both general education and special education programs, including recommendations for modifications and extensions.

The goal of Genius Hour was to get students more engaged in the learning process and to help instill the idea of lifelong learning. Students were asked to brainstorm what their passion was. Students then had to develop an inquiry question related to their passion. Then they had to decide how they would like to show what they learned. Then, students spent time researching about their projects. They were given one hour each Friday to work on their projects. It was an exciting project that students looked forward to working on each week! Because these projects were quite large, they did not all finish at the same time. As students complete their projects, they were able to present what they did to the class.

Watch a series of videos that will teach kids how to code and go on a variety of fun STEM adventures!

STEM is everywhere—from businesses and organizations to the products that power our daily lives. That’s why it’s important to build the first fully STEM literate generation. Endeavor is a first-of-its-kind interactive program designed for middle school students built to empower learners with the knowledge they’ll need to build their career pathways. Learners engage with interactive content that reinforces key STEM skills while discovering some of the exciting STEM opportunities that await.

This Course Covers
The Careers Powering STEM Industries
Big Data and the Internet of Things
The Future of Manufacturing and Design
The Algorithms Behind Recommendations

Throughout the year I have used this as a review for the end of each unit. I create five or six critical thinking questions that apply what we have been learning about. I print them on color paper and spread them around the room. I pair the students up, and have they move about the room solving the questions. I only have ten students in my class so I’m fortunate to have only five pairs at a time. I usually pair them up as sort of a strong and weak combination. This is an attempt to have them collaborate on the problems while using critical thinking.