TeachEngineering

🆕 Pendulum Art: Simple Harmonic Motion with a TWIST!

Students take on the role of biomedical engineers by designing and building paint pendulums that model oscillatory signals similar to brain waves: teachengineering.org/activities/uot-3062-pendulum-art-simple-harmonic-motion-activity

After this hands-on activity, 10th grade students should be able to:

⚙️ Use the complete engineering design process

✏️ Describe simple harmonic motion as it appears in a pendulum

📏 Recognize the determining variables for simple harmonic motion in a pendulum (length and gravity)

🧠 Understand that not all real-life pendulums are “simple"

Middle School STEM educators: Here's a free 7th grade engineering activity you can use this week! 😁

🆕 Rock Solutions: A Solid Underground CO2 Storage Engineering Challenge

Students act as environmental engineers and design underground systems to store carbon dioxide (CO₂) as part of climate change mitigation efforts. Through this activity, students investigate how properties such as porosity, permeability, and cap rock integrity influence the success of geological carbon storage.

Check out this latest addition to our free digital library: teachengineering.org/activities/rice-3060-rock-solid-solutions-challenge-activity

💭 What if you could connect classroom engineering learning to real-word possibilities with free, teacher-friendly resources?

With the new TeachEngineering site, inspiring the next generation of innovators has never been easier! 🤩 See how it looks and works for yourself: teachengineering.org

The same Teach Engineering you love, but with updated visuals and new features to help you spark students' excitement for discovery! ❇️

🥳 It's official: applications are now open! 🏆

This award honors 9th - 12th grade students of all genders, at all levels of technical ability — from absolute beginners to advanced coders! 😍 Winners receive prizes, community, and more!

Learn more and apply now: aspirations.org/award-programs/aic-high-school-award

✍🏼 Applications are open through October 27th!

Engineers incorporate sensors into machines to make them perform complex, precise, and/or tedious tasks. This challenge helps students improve their understanding of how robots both “see” and "think" and widens their appreciation for the complexity involved in programming robots to do what appears to be a simple task.

🆕 Follow the Line: Programming Robots with Color Sensors: teachengineering.org/activities/view/umo-3044-robot-controller-line-follower-activity

After this collaborative activity, students in grades 5-6 should be able to:

🎨 Explain how a color sensor works

🤖 Develop and explain the logic behind programs that instruct robots to use color sensor readings to make decisions

🆕 Check out this latest high school school addition to our free digital library: Synthetic Biology: New Genes, New Proteins 🧬

This activity introduces students to synthetic biology — the engineering of living organisms by designing and modifying DNA to create new biological functions or solve real-world problems — by having them explore how DNA, RNA, and proteins are connected, and how scientists engineer new biological materials!

For students in grades 11-12: teachengineering.org/activities/view/wst-3033-synthetic-biology-new-genes-proteins-activity

⚡ Design Without Building: Simulating the Process of Engineering Memristor Materials: teachengineering.org/activities/view/uot-3050-memristor-materials-engineering-design-activity

In this 🆕 iterative design challenge, tenth grade students ask and answer the question, “How do materials scientists design memristors by predicting material properties at the atomic scale?” Students research the process of computational analysis, and then are challenged to imagine and plan ways to model memristors — a computer device that transmits and saves information by regulating energy flow — using simple materials available in the classroom

➕ This curriculum aligns with Next Generation Science Standards!

In this interactive activity, students become materials engineers — someone who designs and tests new materials used in everyday products — tasked with designing and optimizing a functional polymer-based material through systematic testing and iteration 🫟

🆕 Activity for students in grades 6-8: teachengineering.org/activities/view/uok-3027-get-slimy-exploring-matter-activity

By studying slime, students practice the same kinds of observations and data-driven decisions engineers use to design safer, more sustainable materials for real-world problems!

🆕 Activity for students in grades 4-6: teachengineering.org/activities/view/eclips-3046-nasa-eclips-shower-clock-activity

NASA eClips Our World: Designing a Shower Clock 🚿

Working in three-person teams and using the design engineering process, students connect water-conservation strategies used on the International Space Station (ISS) to their own lives by designing — then testing, refining, and sharing — a shower clock prototype that accurately measures a five-minute shower.

Fifth grade students use the engineering design process to explore how structure affects strength while also focusing on creative, sustainable ways to repair and reuse materials.

🎒 Unbeweavably Strong: teachengineering.org/activities/view/uot-3045-unbeweavably-strong-structutes-materials-activity

Activity goal: Develop a replacement strap using paper (a weak material) by changing its structure to make it strong enough to hold up to 7 kilograms — instead of throwing away a backpack and contributing to landfill waste ♻️