Free, Interdisciplinary Lessons

We strive to create mind-expanding learning experiences that a non-specialist can teach in any G5-12 classroom with 15 minutes of prep time!

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Galactic Polymath Mini-Unit Releases

Each unit has 2-6 lessons created through 100s of collaborative hours by scientists, teachers, artists, and filmmakers.

And they're all free!

A crash course in data literacy using stream ecology
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Data Streams

A crash course in data literacy using stream ecology

ScienceGrades: 9-122 Lessons
Tinkering with Light
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Photon Engineers

Tinkering with Light

ScienceGrades: 6-95 Lessons
How do we provide sustainable energy to communities?

Mā te rauhiringa tātou e ora: Powerful Solutions

How do we provide sustainable energy to communities?

ScienceGrades: 8-123 Lessonsen-USen-NZ
Tradeoffs in frogs, humans, and other animals

Balancing Act

Tradeoffs in frogs, humans, and other animals

ScienceGrades: 9-122 Lessons
Evolution's Testing Grounds

Hybrid Zones

Evolution's Testing Grounds

ScienceGrades: 8-123 Lessons
A Pop Culture Intro to Birding by Ear

Heard That Bird

A Pop Culture Intro to Birding by Ear

ScienceGrades: 6-121 Lessons
Building Resilience in Science

SciJourneys

Building Resilience in Science

ScienceGrades: 6–103 Lessons
A Choose-Your-Own STEM Adventure

Pacific H2O

A Choose-Your-Own STEM Adventure

ScienceYears: 9-134 Lessons
Looking to Biology for Better Solutions

Bioinspired Design

Looking to Biology for Better Solutions

ScienceGrades: 8-University5 Lessons
How group behavior can produce surprising problems...and solutions!

Animal Collective

How group behavior can produce surprising problems...and solutions!

ScienceGrades: 11-university6 Lessons
Exploring how crystal symmetry can power everyday life

Electric Crystals

Exploring how crystal symmetry can power everyday life

ScienceGrades: 7-124 Lessons
How perception, emotion, and cognition shape our preferences

I Like That!

How perception, emotion, and cognition shape our preferences

ScienceGrades: 5-93 Lessons
Chemical Engineering Dyes to Brighten Lives

Colorful Solutions

Chemical Engineering Dyes to Brighten Lives

ScienceGrades: 8-123 Lessonsen-USen-NZ
Why Exceptions Matter in Biology and Everyday Life

Guardian Frogs of Borneo

Why Exceptions Matter in Biology and Everyday Life

ScienceGrades: 5-93 Lessons
Preventing extinction through gene flow

Genetic Rescue to the Rescue

Preventing extinction through gene flow

ScienceGrades: 9-125 Lessons
Challenging long-held assumptions about birdsong through data visualization

Females singing to be heard

Challenging long-held assumptions about birdsong through data visualization

MathGrades: 5–8 & 9–123 Lessons

Made open access by these funding organizations and research institutions:

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Galactic Polymath Learning Tools

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Jobviz Career Explorer

A starting point for students to explore 1,000 job possibilities
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Powering the Marae

Use this interactive web game to define a robust power mix for the fictional community at Punahiko Marae.
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PacificH2O Interactive Web App

A Choose-Your-Own Adventure app that mediates a blended learning lab. Students identify & remove impurities in water samples as they embody different STEM career roles.
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"Swimming in the Dark"

Run digital experiments to understand fish schooling.
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"EchoSim" Echo Chamber Simulation

Explore how different human variables (like tolerance) affect social media networks.

Galactic Polymath Videos

For Lesson 3 of TEST.
For Lesson 3 of TEST.
For Lesson 4 of TEST.
For Lesson 1 of Data Streams.
For Lesson 2 of Data Streams.
Part of Photon Engineers.
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Galactic Polymath Individual Lessons

Free lessons to engage students in current research, real world problems, and interdisciplinary thinking.

PPSTT: The secrets of interpreting data
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A step by step procedure for interpreting a graph developed with scientists.

ScienceGrades: 9-12
45 min
data literacy
whole class presentation
group work

Part of: Data Streams

Are streams wet? Practicing data literacy with flow data
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Students use the PPSTT method to compare and contrast streamflow data from 5 locations to solve a mystery. Lesson guided by scientists doing the same activity.

ScienceGrades: 9-12
45 min
data literacy
cognitive apprenticeship

Part of: Data Streams

Seeing through time: A puzzling history of optics
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Discover the secrets printed on the US dollar bill using a water drop-lens, and explore lens innovations throughout history with a timeline puzzle sort.

ScienceGrades: 6-9
45 min
hands-on
interdisciplinary

Part of: Photon Engineers

What's a lens? Bending light for sight
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Learn how lenses bend light through an interactive video, and brainstorm new materials to design a sight-correcting lens.

ScienceGrades: 6-9
45 min
scientific models

Part of: Photon Engineers

What is light? Making waves
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Illustrate the anatomy of a wave by linking together as a human wave-medium to transmit waves with different amplitudes and frequencies. Then, investigate the full spectrum of light waves with a ranking game.

ScienceGrades: 6-9
45 min
physical activity
kinesthetic model

Part of: Photon Engineers

Communicating with light: A message to Mars
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Expand on the advanced properties of light. Then design a code that uses waves to send a message to Mars!

ScienceGrades: 6-9
45 min
communication
collaboration

Part of: Photon Engineers