SHiPS Resource Center || ships.umn.edu   Curriculum Modules
 
Each exercise here highlights some aspect of the history, philosophy or social dimensions of science. Search by level or topic.

General || Primary (K-6) || Biology || Earth Science || Chemistry || Physics
Thematic Lessons: Women & Gender || Culture || Religion || Ethics
Please contribute your own successes.


General

  • A Lesson to Dye For [Middle School, integrated]
    Plant dyes are a focus for integrating student invesitgations, history and art. Students use trial-and-error and controlled experiment to explore different plant sources, fibers, colors, mordants, and large scale dyeing. Dyed products can lead to various handcraft projects, such as basic stitchery. Lessons also include the historical, geographical and economic roles of dyes. Role-play of an important woman of Colonial times who introduced indigo to the U.S.
  • women in the Scientific Revolution -- Hildegard von Bingen/middle school astronomy and Maria Merian/insects
  • Expertise & the Social Dimension of Science [HIPST*]
  • scientific societies (Frederico Cesi and the Accademia Lincei)


Primary

  • Contested Currents (Edison & Westinghouse on AC vs. DC current) [grades 4-6]
  • Chemical and Human Resources, Part I
    Third grade students study mystery powders to understand physical and chemical properties and their changes, while learning about the chemists who first made those discoveries historically.
  • Chemical and Human Resources, Part II
    In the fourth, fifth and sixth grade, students research these historical chemists in more depth, enacting them in vignettes, and teaching their findings to the third graders.


Biology (incl. Medicine)

Doing Biology (Harper Collins, 1996)

Doing Biology cover
  1. H.B.D. Kettlewell & the Peppered Moths
  2. Robert Whittaker & the Classification of Kingdoms
  3. Lynn Margulis & the Question of How Cells Evolved
  4. Nettie Stevens & the Problem of Sex Determination
  5. Thomas Hunt Morgan & the White-eyed Mutant
  6. Oswald Avery & the Search for the Transforming Factor
  7. Hans Krebs & the Problem of Cellular Respiration
  8. Peter Mitchell & How Cells Make ATP
  9. Walter Cannon & Self-Regulation in Animals
  10. Hans Seyle, Hormones & Stress
  11. Christiaan Eijkman & the Cause of Beriberi
  12. Western Science, Pain & Acupuncture
  13. Frank M. Burnet & How Animals Make Antibodies
  14. Niko Tinbergen & the Mating Behavior of Sticklebacks
  15. J.B.S. Haldane & the Hardy-Weinberg Model
  16. George Gaylord Simpson & Continental Drift
  17. Rachel Carson & Silent Spring


Chemistry


Physics


Earth Sciences (Geology, Astronomy, Meteorology, Oceanography)

last updated: 9/7/10

SHiPS
    SHiPS helps teachers share resources for integrating history, philosophy and sociology in the science classroom.