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Type: Lesson Plan

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will learn the process of photosynthesis by designing an experiment to distinguish between the light and dark stages of photosynthesis.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is an engaging lesson using probeware to look at photosynthesis and respiration with spinach leaves.

Type: Lesson Plan

This is a lab activity resource to accompany learning of photosynthesis and the Calvin cycle. Students are able to measure change in water conditions and gaseous production associated with autotrophs.

Type: Lesson Plan

The Corn Conundrum MEA provides students with an agricultural problem in which they must work as a team to develop a procedure to select the best variety of corn to grow under drier conditions predicted by models of global climate change. Students must determine the most important factors that make planting crops sustainable in restricted climate conditions for the client. The main focus of this MEA is manipulating factors relating to plant biology, including transpiration and photosynthesis.

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

Learn how to identify and describe the role of all of the major molecules needed for photosynthesis. You'll also be able to explain the role that photosynthesis plays in capturing carbon from the atmosphere to produce sugars.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Patrick Milligan shares his research on invasive ant species in the Kenyan savannah.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

A NASA botanist explains how studying photosynthesis now can help feed astronauts in the future.

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Expert

Get organized with charts to help you understand major biochemical processes!

Download the CPALMS Perspectives video student note taking guide.

Type: Perspectives Video: Teaching Idea

This presentation, a narrated PowerPoint, provides detailed information regarding photosynthesis and cellular respiration. It is provided by a teacher for his students, but is well-done and engaging enough to be useful for other students.

Type: Presentation/Slideshow

This informational text resource is intended to support reading in the content area. Geologists have made an important discovery about the origins of photosynthesis. According to evidence in South African rocks, before organisms were using water as the electron source for photosynthesis, they were using manganese - these rocks formed in anoxic conditions, but contain oxidized manganese. This evolution of photosynthetic organisms, which released atmospheric oxygen, laid the groundwork for more complex life forms, such as animals, to come into existence.

Type: Text Resource

This tutorial is a step by step explanation of what occurs in photosynthesis during the Calvin Cycle. It describes and uses visuals for the chemical reactions in this biochemical pathway. This challenging tutorial addresses the standard at a high level of complexity.

Type: Tutorial

This tutorial shows and describes what occurs during the light reactions of photosynthesis which is the first stage of photosynthesis when plants capture and store energy from sunlight. In this process, light energy is converted into chemical energy, in the form of the energy-carrying molecules ATP and NADPH.

Type: Tutorial

This Khan Academy video explains how CAM plants fix carbon dioxide at night so they do not lose water by opening their stomata during the day.

Type: Tutorial

The Khan Academy video discusses how some plants avoid photorespiration by fixing carbon in the bundle sheath cells instead of the mesophylll cells.

Type: Tutorial

This Khan Academy video reviews the Calvin Cycle in C3 photosynthesis and discusses the reactants and products of this process. The video then describes photorespiration which is what occurs when the enzyme RuBisCO fixes oxygen instead of carbon dioxide and explains why this is considered an inefficient pathway for plants.

Type: Tutorial

This Khan Academy tutorial explains in detail the process of the light reactions of photosynthesis including the importance of the thylakoid membrane and the products that are produced from this reaction.

Type: Tutorial

This Khan Academy tutorial explains how the by-products from the light reactions of photosynthesis are used to produce sugar molecules in the Calvin Cycle.

Type: Tutorial

Photosynthesis is an essential part of the exchange between humans and plants. Amanda Ooten walks us through the process of photosynthesis, also discussing the relationship between photosynthesis and carbohydrates, starch, and fiber -- and how the air we breathe is related to the food we ingest.

Type: Tutorial

A hearty bowl of cereal gives you the energy to start your day, but how exactly did that energy make its way into your bowl? It all begins with photosynthesis, the process that converts the air we breathe into energizing glucose. Cathy Symington details the highly efficient second phase of photosynthesis -- called the Calvin cycle -- which converts carbon dioxide into sugar with some clever mix-and-match math.

Type: Tutorial

• Observe the photosynthesis mechanism in the plant
• Learn about the main chemical reactions that takes place during photosynthesis
• Learn how solar energy is converted into chemical energy

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

The topic of photosynthesis is a fundamental concept in biology, chemistry, and earth science. Educational studies have found that despite classroom presentations, most students retain their naïve idea that a plant's mass is mostly derived from the soil, and not from the air. To call students' attention to this misconception, at the beginning of this lesson we will provide a surprising experimental result so that students will confront their mental mistake. Next, we will help students better envision photosynthesis by modeling where the atoms come from in this important process that produces food for the planet. This lesson can be completed in 50-60 minutes, with the students working on in-class activities during 20-25 minutes of the lesson. As a prerequisite, students need an introductory lesson on photosynthesis, something that includes the overall chemical equation. If students have already studied the intracellular photosynthetic process in detail, this video can still be very helpful because students often miss the big picture about photosynthesis. Materials needed include red, white and black LEGO bricks (described in downloadable hand-out) or strips of red, white and black paper plus paper clips (directions provided in downloadable hand-out). In addition to class discussions, the major in-class activity of this video involves the students' modeling with LEGO® bricks or colored paper where the atoms come from in photosynthesis.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

These animations show cell respiration as a big picture, and then go through the steps of cellular respiration: glycolysis, the Krebs cycle, and electron transport. Each animation is short and to the point.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This video provides an overview of photosynthesis.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This site has fantastic short Flash animations of intricate cell processes, including photosynthesis and the electron transport chain.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation

This video gives more detail on the light reaction and photophosphorylation that occur in photosynthesis.

Type: Video/Audio/Animation