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Have you been searching for interactive way to teach scientific inquiry? Are you unhappy with the 2-D model of the scientific method represented in your science textbook? The University of Berkeley has a wonderful resource for you. This is an interactive concept map of scientific inquiry. You can deliver this content as a whole group using a smart broad or small learning communities. This resource is free and offers the concept map in PDF form with blanks for your students and in PDF poster for your class. In addition to this website, the University of Berkeley offers so much more. Happy browsing.

Type: Instructional Technique

Students will evaluate what types of evidence provide relevant and logical support for moon formation theories.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will conduct a simple laboratory experience that practices the proper use of controls and variables. Students will conduct a controlled experiment in their laboratory groups.

Type: Lesson Plan

This lesson allows the students to discover that science is everywhere. It encourages students to apply their scientific skills and to think creatively in their everyday lives.

Type: Lesson Plan

The goal is that students understand that hypotheses are subject to revision when new information becomes available. It is also extremely important that students understand that while most hypotheses are not correct, testing them adds to science knowledge.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students should be able to gain an understanding that developing a hypothesis often leads to further hypotheses whether data is correct or not. Students will engage in an activity to develop a bridge structure from given materials and hypothesize which structure is strongest.

Type: Lesson Plan

Learn how to write an effective hypothesis with sharks as a focus in this interactive tutorial. A hypothesis should be testable and falsifiable. 

Type: Original Student Tutorial

This brief article summarizes the research-based rationale for using inquiry-based activities in their classrooms. It also provides specific suggestions to help teachers plan lessons that encourage students to generate predictions based on hypotheses, design investigations to test the validity of their ideas, and utilize questioning techniques to promote critical thinking.

Type: Professional Development

A simulated crime scene is presented for teams of students to solve, using clues received piecemeal, adjusting hypotheses as more clues are found and discussed. The elements of science are recognized through discussion of the crime solution metaphor. Also clearly shows how science is used effectively to reveal unwitnessed events of the past (by weighing the evidence), much as we do in paleontology, geology, evolution and astronomy.

Type: Teaching Idea

Most planetary scientists expected that lunar samples brought to Earth at the end of each of the six Apollo missions would confirm one of three leading hypotheses of the Moon's origin. Instead, samples left all three explanations unconfirmed, requiring the development of a new hypothesis for how the Moon formed. This video segment adapted from NOVA shows Apollo 15 astronauts collecting a type of rock that would help change our understanding of the Moon's - and Earth's - earliest history.

Type: Teaching Idea