STEM
February 5, 2014 - February 11, 2014

Find the latest educational resources from Iowa Public Television.

Percy Julian: Forgotten Genius

Grades: 3-12

In 1950, Percy Julian was one of the few African Americans with a Ph.D. He was Chicago's man of the year and a groundbreaking scientist. But it wasn't an easy road. Denied teaching positions and the target of death threats, Julian struggled to get ahead in a racially hostile world. Learn more about Percy Julian's contributions to science and civil rights. These resources, adapted from NOVA: "Forgotten Genius," explore how Julian revolutionized chemistry with the first synthesis of a chemical compound, as well as the challenges he overcame as an African American facing legalized segregation. Also check out the teacher's guide for this NOVA program.

Technology: How Companies Use Tech That Tracks You at Home and on the Road
Grade Range: 7-12

Smart gadgets collect user information so that they can adapt to individual habits and personal tastes. But as this technology becomes more pervasive - embedded in automobiles, refrigerators, even fire alarms and thermostats - many fear the ways that private companies could misuse private customer data.

Real Life Science Horror Story: West Coast Starfish Ripping Themselves Apart

Grade Range: 7-12

Up and down the Pacific Coast, starfish are dying in a gruesome way and no one knows why.

Teaching Environmental Public Health: An Introduction
Grade Range: K-13+

This lesson designed for professional development is a general introduction to the subject of environmental public health. Explore how people's environment relates to their health and how they can learn to reduce exposure to health hazards. View videos, use interactive activities, and answer questions to explore five basic topics in environmental public health: conditions and diseases, exposures and risk, research methods, community action, and health policy. Finish the lesson by using the five topics as a framework to examine an environmental health hazard of your own choosing.

Down to the Core Challenge
Grade Range: 3-8

Analyzing samples from a planet, moon, or asteroid helps scientists learn about its chemistry, geologic history, and potential to support past or present life. Nearly every NASA surface mission collects samples. In this video from Design Squad Nation, kids design and build coring devices that can poke into a potato "asteroid" and extract a core sample. The kids use the engineering design process, apply a variety of science concepts, and learn about NASA's exploration of the solar system. This resource is useful for introducing components of Engineering Design (ETS) from the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) to grade K-8 students.

Additive Inverse
Grade Range: 7

This animated Math Shorts video from the Utah Education Network explains the term additive inverse and provides several examples that demonstrate the concept. In the

accompanying classroom activity, students create equations and solve problems that involve adding groups of negative and positive integers that sum to zero. To get the most out of this activity, students should be familiar with plotting positive and negative integers on a number line.

Graphing Distance and Time: Travel
Grade Range: 5-8

In this blended lesson supporting literacy skills, students watch videos and complete interactive activities to learn how to represent a young man's unicycle trip on a graph. Students develop their literacy skills as they explore a mathematics focus on expressing distance-time relationships with graphs. During this process, they read informational text, learn and practice vocabulary words, and explore content through videos and interactive activities.

Resources | PBS LearningMedia | PBS KIDS | Iowa Public Television