OK Go Sandbox clusters its materials by music video. Teachers need to keep digging to realize all the site has to offer. The tools work best if teachers take the time to explore each of the connected resources and build a plan that works for their grade level and classroom. For example, How Parabolas Work has two lesson plans using the same set of videos. The General Parabolas guide is geared toward middle school students, and the Advanced Parabolas guide is aligned with high school Common Core standards. This might be useful for teachers who are differentiating within one class; the entire class can watch the video, but different groups may engage in different tasks afterward.
Resources that support each other are grouped on the site. In the "Hit the Note" lesson, students are asked to use the Google Science Journal app to tune glass cups and play a song. OK Go Sandbox has paired this with a Science Journal scavenger hunt to help students familiarize themselves with another great free tool.
Continue readingOK Go Sandbox hooks kids with indie group OK Go's music videos and then follows up with guided inquiry and engineering design challenges. Elementary through high school students get ideas from the videos and use them to make their own creations.
Lessons are linked to physical science, math, and art standards. Kids use parabolas to figure out how the band achieved zero gravity in the "Upside Down & Inside Out" video. The flip books in the "One More Moment" video inspire students to make their own flip books, where art and innovation are emphasized more than any particular content. Each video is paired with lesson plans that include worksheets and directions for hands-on challenges. For example, students are asked to graph the parabolas they find in two differently shaped bowls.