Media Specialists
October 2-October 9, 2013

Find the latest educational resources from Iowa Public Television.

Crack Hacker's Safe
Grades: 3-5

In this Cyberchase interactive, you must complete a series of shape, number and color patterns to crack Hacker's safe. Given the first four terms in the pattern, you must select the correct color/number/shape combination of the next term.

Formulas: Area of a Circle

Grades: 9-13+

Learning about formulas will help you develop a strong foundation for your work in geometry. This video explains the formula for finding the area of a circle.

Unit Conversion: Water Use

Grades: 5-8

In this blended lesson supporting literacy skills, students watch videos and complete interactive activities to learn how much water various activities use and explore ways that they can conserve water resources. Students develop their literacy skills as they explore a mathematics focus on using fractions to convert units of measurement. During this process, they read informational text, learn and practice vocabulary words, and explore content through videos and interactive activities.

Antarctica Today
Grade Range: 4-12

Take a trip to Earth's freezer - the coldest, windiest, driest, place on Earth. How long has Antarctica been like it is today? That's what polar researchers want to find out. Meet ANDRILL, the Antarctic drilling team in this video.

Family History and Genealogical Research
Grade Range: 4-13+

History Detectives' collection of resources illustrating research methodology for investigating genealogy and family history.

No Bigger Than a Minute

Grade Range: 9-12

For forty years, four-foot-tall filmmaker Steven Delano has lived his life as a reluctant celebrity, disavowing his dwarf deviance and avoiding both the benefits and potential traumas of real self-discovery. In making this film Steven uses his license-of-stature and a healthy dose of irreverent humor to show first-hand how a genetic mutation marks a person for life. This resource group includes three clips associated with the film, as well as a related activity.

Up the Yangtze
Grade Range: 6-12

Nearing completion, China's massive Three Gorges Dam is altering the landscape and the lives of people living along the fabled Yangtze River. Countless ancient villages and historic locales will be submerged, and 2 million people will lose their homes and livelihoods. The Yu family desperately seeks a reprieve by sending their 16-year-old daughter to work in the cruise ship industry that has sprung up to give tourists a last glimpse of the legendary river valley. With cinematic sweep, Up the Yangtze explores lives transformed by the biggest hydroelectric dam in history, a hotly contested symbol of the Chinese economic miracle.

Critical Condition: The U.S. Health Care Crisis
Grade Range: 9-13

This lesson plan is designed to be used with the film Critical Condition, which tells the stories of four uninsured Americans as they battle illness over a two-year period. Classrooms can use this lesson to examine health insurance coverage in America and create public service announcements to connect the uninsured with free and subsidized health care services.

Illuminating Photosynthesis
Grade Range: 3-12

This interactive feature from NOVA explores the process plants use to convert solar energy into chemical energy. The site points out that photosynthesis is responsible for feeding nearly all life forms on Earth, and that the process generates, as a by-product, an element that is critically important to the survival of humans and most other animals: oxygen.

Rosemary Wells
Grade Range: 2-7

Rosemary Wells is the author and illustrator of delightful books for youngsters. In this interview, Wells talks about creating books for children and their adult readers that will stand up to being read over and over again. Watch the interview, view the interview transcript, read a short biography on Rosemary Wells, or see a selected list of her children's books.

New Muslim Cool: Interpreting Diverse Images of Muslim Life in the United States
Grade Range: 6-12

Help increase students' understanding of Muslim culture in the United States with this lesson plan, which incorporates clips from the POV film New Muslim Cool.

Tiktaalik: A Fish Out of Water
Grade Range: 5-8

In this blended lesson supporting literacy skills, students learn that transitional fossils provide scientists with evidence to establish how major animal groups are related to one another in evolutionary terms. Students develop their literacy skills as they explore a science focus on a recently discovered fossil named Tiktaalik. During this process, they read informational text, learn and practice vocabulary words, and explore content through a video and interactive activities.

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