All Science and Children resources

Journal Article

This standard lesson on identifying salt and sugar crystals expands into an opportunity for students to develop their observation, questioning, and modeling skills. Although sugar and salt may look similar, students discovered that they looked very d...

Journal Article

Home Connections: Demystifying Mixtures

The subject of chemistry makes most people think of an elaborate laboratory, but investigating chemistry concepts does not require expensive equipment or chemicals. You can perform some of the same tests scientists do using materials in your home. On...

Journal Article

Real Earthquakes, Real Learning

One teacher took her class on a year long earthquake expedition. The goal was to monitor the occurrences of real earthquakes during the year and mark their locations with push pins on a wall-sized world map in the hallway outside the science room. T...

Journal Article

Collaborating with WISE Scientists

Through an interactive partnership, fifth-grade students collected data on plants and joined an active scientific community of working scientists. This Web-based Integrated Science Environment (WISE) project involved asking questions about plants, gr...

Journal Article

Our Zoo to You

An innovative zoo outreach program, Our Zoo to You, places zoo animals in local classrooms for extended observation periods. With guidance and support from zoo staff, students are able to safely experience a variety of animals, including geckos, sna...

Journal Article

It's a Frog's Life

When a preschool teacher unexpectedly found tadpoles in the school's outdoor baby pool, she recognized an unusual opportunity for her students to study pond life up close. By following the tadpoles' development, students learned about frogs, life cyc...

Journal Article

Home Connections: Act Fast!

This simple, at-home activity explores reaction time. Working with a partner, a student drops a ruler for the partner to catch. Measuring the distance that the ruler fell before being caught can be used to calculate reaction time....

Journal Article

Teaching through Trade Books: Dealing with Data

The elementary classroom is full of opportunities to collect and organize information—or data—of all kinds. This article suggests two trade books that help children explore concepts of measurement. A background section and data-gathering activiti...