Who Moved the Beach?
Posted on May 30th, 2017 by Mary Lord
High school students working in groups of three to four learn about the primary causes and impacts of coastal erosion, and use elevation data to construct profiles of a beach over time or to compare several beaches, make inferences about the erosion process, and discuss how humans should respond.
Filed under: Class Activities, Grades 9-12, Grades 9-12, Grades 9-12, Lesson Plans | Comments Off on Who Moved the Beach?
Tags: beach, Civil Engineering, Class Activities, coastal erosion, coastal management, data analysis, Earth Science, Environmental Engineering, erosion, Grades 9-12, jetties, Lesson Plan, NOAA, USGS
Students in grades 3 to 8 study coastal erosion and the apply the engineering design process to devise structures and policies to protect shorelines, taking public concerns into account.
Middle school students learn that ordinary people like themselves can make meaningful contributions to science by reviewing examples of citizen science projects on Zooniverse, an interactive website. They then form “engineering teams” to brainstorm projects for their own community and design conceptual interactive websites that could organize and support them. 
Students in grades 5-9 learn about urban planning as they assess the environmental health of their community, taking a walk around their neighborhood. They construct a map that identifies both positive and negative features and then recommend improvements.
Students in grades 3 – 5 learn how alphanumeric symbols can be encoded for many fun purposes. In the first of two sessions, they learn about codes by making their own with a limited number of symbols. They then attempt to break each other’s codes and discover the relationship among encryption, decryption, and shared keys.
Teams of middle school students use the engineering design process to design, build, and test a pair of wearable platform or high-heeled shoes, taking into consideration the stress and strain on the wearer’s foot. They activity concludes with a “walk-off” to test the shoe designs and discuss the design process.
In this activity, teams of middle school students express their creativity while learning the fundamentals of engineering design, sustainability, and the basic physics of forces and motion by building a vehicle out of recycled trash that is capable of transporting liquid over rough terrain with as little spillage as possible.
The CyberPatriot Elementary School Cyber Education Initiative (ESCEI) is a set of three fun, interactive learning modules aimed at increasing K-6 students’ awareness of online safety and cybersecurity principles. The free program kit comes with curriculum on these topics to supplement material presented in the interactive learning modules.
In this activity, students in grades 2 to 8 learn about applied forces and elements of the engineering design process by creating a pop-up card or book.
