Instructor David Howe provides students in grades 4-6 with a fun and motivational opportunity to learn about science. The programs present our national science standards in a light-hearted and engaging way, focusing on themes that are interesting and captivating for kids.

Howe About Science focuses on three themes: Mission to Mars, Investigations in the Rain Forest, and Exploring the Human Body. Although the themes sound very specific, they allow virtually all of the national science standards to be addressed and provide for exploration and comparison with local issues.

Each program will focus on a particular concept and one or more follow-up activities will be suggested to give students an opportunity to explore a topic in more detail.

Show descriptions:

Mission to Mars

Lesson 1 - Invent a Tool Scientist, engineer, tool, technology, and science
Lesson 2 - Ball on Mars
Lesson 3 - Solar System Solar System, astronomical unit, channels, carbon dioxide
Lesson 4 - Million & Billion Millions, billions, and light years
Lesson 5 - Strange New Planet Orbiter, lander, and rover
Lesson 6 - Seltzer Rockets Robert Goddard, Isaac Newton, action, and reaction
Lesson 7 - Model Rockets Thrust, forces of flight, combustion, and oxidation.
Lesson 8 - Build Hovercraft Drag, friction, aerodynamic shape, and vacuum.
Lesson 9 - Balloon Payload Gravity and payload
Lesson 10 - Mars Rover Rover, stereo vision, and entry, descent, and landing
Lesson 11 - Bernoulli's Principle Atmosphere, Bernoulli's Principle, and airfoil
Lesson 12 - Hot Air Balloons Density, mass, and volume
Lesson 13 - Flowing Water Canali, channels, erosion, and sediments
Lesson 14 - It's Alive Life, environment, stimulus, and chemical change

 

Investigations in the Rain Forest

Lesson 1 - Biodiversity Rainforests, biomes, and biodiversity
Lesson 2 - Rainforest Collage Chicle, rattan, and cacao
Lesson 3 - Rain in the Kitchen The water cycle, evaporation, condensation and precipitation
Lesson 4 - Coloring Flowers Transpiration, osmosis, and capillary action
Lesson 5 - Mars Airplane Mars airplane, solvents, and solutes.
Lesson 6 - Thunderstorm Radiation, conduction, and convection.
Lesson 7 - Barometer Warm front, low pressure area, and barometer.
Lesson 8 - Cloud in a Bottle Cirrus, stratus, and cumulus.
Lesson 9 - Tornado in a Bottle Tornados, cyclones, vortex, and hurricanes.
Lesson 10 - Tropic Terrarium Closed systems, ecosystem, biotic, and abiotic.
Lesson 11 - Echolocation Fruit bats, echolocation, seed dispersal, and pollination.
Lesson 12 - Weaving Web Food chains, food webs, producers, and consumers.
Lesson 13 - Owl Pellets Predators, prey, carrying capacity, and owl pellets
Lesson 14 - Infrared Light Electromagnetic radiation, infrared, and temperature
Lesson 15 - Square Meter Community, population, and limiting factor
Lesson 16 - Mold Garden Habitat, the forest floor, and decomposers
Lesson 17 - Fun Fungus Niche, cellular respiration, and fermentation
Lesson 18 - Wolf Conservation Endangered species, alpha wolves, gps, and radio collars
Lesson 19 - Make Yogurt Bacteria, saprophyte, parasites, and hosts
Lesson 20 - Bug Lady Arthropods, insects, and conservation
Lesson 21 - Dirty-Handed Understory, natural selection, and "antibacterial"
Lesson 22 - Orchids Orchids, epiphyte, and symbiosis
Lesson 23 - Creepy Critters Classification, taxonomy, and linnaeus
Lesson 24 - Dichotomous Key The dichotomous key, species, and scientific names
Lesson 25 - Build a Flower The canopy, the bromeliad, and the strangler fig
Lesson 26 - Make a Rainforest The emergent zone, liana, and "prehensile"
Lesson 27 - Habitat Shrink Habitat destruction, slash and burn agriculture, and sustainable
Lesson 28 - Population Growth Overpopulation, exponential growth, doubling time
Lesson 29 - Packaging Predicament Resources, both renewable and nonrenewable
Lesson 30 - Greenhouse Effect Global warming, the greenhouse effect, and fossil fuels
Lesson 31 - Acid Breath Greenhouse gases, acid, bases, and the pH scale
Lesson 32 - Rainforest Review Review of lessons 1 through 32

 

Exploring the Human Body

Lesson 1 - Balanced Tangle Systems and center of gravity
Lesson 2 - Keeping Heat In Homeostasis and surface area
Lesson 3 - Weightlessness Free fall, weightlessness, Zero G, and microgravity
Lesson 4 - Support Structures Skeletons, endoskeletons, exoskeletons, and truss structure
Lesson 5 - Inner Strength Vertebrae, invertebrate, bone, and cartilage
Lesson 6 - Muscle Fibers Muscle cells, skeletal muscle, smooth muscle, and cardiac muscle
Lesson 7 - Prosthetics prosthesis, amputation, electrode, and myoelectric
Lesson 8 - Gravity & Muscles Posture, center of gravity, and atrophy
Lesson 9 - Robot Hand Robots, engineers, and the remote manipulator system
Lesson 10 - Pulse of Life The cardiovascular system, arteries, veins, and pulse
Lesson 11 - Heart Solutions Catheters, heart catheterization, and transducers
Lesson 12 - Map the Brain The nervous system, stimulus, and response
Lesson 13 - Learning the Brain Dyslexia and epilepsy
Lesson 14 - Motion Sickness Equilibrium, vestibular system, space motion sickness, and decibels