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The 10 teams of the Consortium for Education developed a wonderful variety of online learning units and learning communities. More than 340 teachers participated in the work of creating the learning activities, lessons, and units found in the web sites here.
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- Bridging the Watershed
Potomac Area National Parks of the National Park Service
- The Potomac Area National Parks partnered with schools in the Washington, DC, metropolitan area to offer high school students opportunities to study real-world science in the national parks. This project created online activities to help teachers prepare students with necessary skills prior to their visiting the parks. The four activities can be used in other settings and science classrooms:
- The Case of the Straw Bale Wall
Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)
- ORNL collaborated with 11 teachers to produce an online learning unit for Grades 5-8 on three fundamental principles of energy transfer: conduction, convection, and radiation. The Energy Transfer Unit is a self-contained computer aided instruction product.
- Connecting Classrooms to NASA Aeronautics Experts
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- NASA involved nine teachers in the eight-week learning activity of building a glider and in developing three lesson plans using wind tunnel data. These lessons focus on lift and drag, the relationship between an airplane's pitch and lift, and the comparison of a wing's angle of attack and the coefficient of lift.
- The Constitution Community
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)
- NARA formed a partnership with nine teachers to produce 35 online lessons and activities that address constitutional issues, correlate to national academic standards, and emphasize analysis of primary documents. Lessons are appropriate for students in upper-elementary grades through college.
- Earth and Space Science Investigations
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Education Programs
- The Goddard space flight Center Education Programs worked with science teachers to create five investigations and to review, pilot test, and finalize 74 investigations on climate, ocean currents, ozone, magnetism in space, solar activity and more. It also worked with teachers to develop a 155-day course in earth and space science for high school.
- EarthKAM Project
NASA's Langley Research Center (LaRC)
- (LaRC) allowed middle school students from 27 schools in three states to send longitude, latitude, and other information via the web to a space shuttle computer, where it would activate a digital camera. Students would use the resulting photos for their investigations related to earth science and geography. The space shuttle's postponement from December 1998 to July 1999 undercut this team's effort.
- H.I.P. Pocket Change
The U.S. Mint
- The U.S. Mint created a partnership of nine teachers, five numismatic organizations, and more than 20 U.S. Mint staff to create an educational web site to stir interest in coins, U.S. history, and the Mint. For teachers, the web site offers 12 lessons in history, language arts, and math.
- Updating the Lewis and Clark Journals
National Park Service's Fort Clatsop national Memorial
- The fort Clatsop National Memorial partnered with students and teachers in six states to document today's views of selected Lewis and Clark journal entries using the methods and standards of 21st century scientists and scholars. The learning community included approximately 650 students and staff in 17 school districts.
- Water in Africa
Peace Corps
- Peace Corps' World Wise Schools set out to develop standards-based learning units on how water is used in daily life in Africa. Photos and anecdotal observations were collected from Peace Corps Volunteers in 25 countries in Africa. Seven teachers created over 20 learning units based on the resources sent from Africa.
- Web de Anza
National Park Service
- The National Park Service involved 24 teachers at 11 different schools in three states and two countries to create a web-based study environment to promote historical inquiry into Juan Bautista de Anza and his two 18th-century overland expeditions through what is now northern Mexico, Arizona, and California. More than 10 lessons and units, and a six-step process for history inquiry were created.
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