Grade 6 Lab / experiment
Testing Three Pipe Bedding Materials for Oskett Lane
Students load a model pipe on soil, sand, and pea gravel, then measure settling, drainage, and soil movement to pick the bedding a fictional water main job needs.
NGSS · Middle School (6–8)
MS-ETS1-3 Combine the best features of designs into a new solution
Analyze data from tests to determine similarities and differences among several design solutions to identify the best characteristics of each that can be combined into a new solution to better meet the criteria for success.
Why water teaches this standard well
After testing several filter recipes, students merge the best layers of each, perhaps one design's gravel base with another's charcoal stage, into an improved prototype. Combining winning features from multiple tests is exactly how treatment trains are optimized in practice.
Materials tagged with this code are written to the full standard , and each carries a written note explaining the alignment. See how we review materials.
17 materials aligned to MS-ETS1-3
Labs & experiments
Grade 7 Lab / experiment
Braycott Basin Baffles: Testing Three Layouts for Clearer Water
A grade 7 lab where teams test three baffle layouts in a model settling basin, then build a fourth that combines features from their best layout and a partner team's.
Grade 8 Lab / experiment
Crayfen Ridge Pond Covers: Testing Three Evaporation Shields
A grade 8 lab in which teams run four-day evaporation trials on three cover designs, score each against stated criteria, and build a combined cover from the winners.
Grade 6 Lab / experiment
Pellham Flats Well Screen Gravel Pack Design Lab
Students build three model well screens with different gravel pack depths, time how fast each drains, and measure how much sand each lets through before choosing one.
Grade 7 Lab / experiment
Ashford Mills Filter Trade-Off: Flow Rate Versus Clarity
Students build three filter designs, time how fast each runs, rate how clear the water is, and find the trade-off between speed and clarity.
Grade 7 Lab / experiment
Saltcrest Ridge Fog Catcher: Testing Mesh Panels for Water Capture
A grade 7 lab where students build three mesh panels, spray them under identical conditions, and use the collected volumes to design a better fog-catching panel.
Grade 8 Lab / experiment
Ashen Ford Grit Channel: Testing Settling Speed to Set Length
A grade 8 lab where teams time sand, silt, and coffee grounds settling through three water depths, then use the speed to size a wastewater grit channel.
Grade 8 Lab / experiment
A Tabletop Solar Still for Brinehaven: Measuring Desalination Yield
A grade 8 lab where students build a solar still, measure fresh water collected over time, and compute a collection rate and percent recovery from salt water.
Grade 8 Lab / experiment
Ravensworth Settling Column: How Time Clears Cloudy Water
A grade 8 lab where students track a settling column's clarity over 40 minutes, graph clarity against time, and connect the trend to sedimentation-basin design.
Grade 8 Lab / experiment
Redbank Creek Jar Test: Finding the Best Coagulant Dose
A grade 8 science lab where students run a jar test, dosing muddy water with alum, rate each jar's clarity, and find the coagulant dose that clears it best.
Classroom activities
Grade 6 Classroom activity
Camp Marloch Constructed Wetland Design Activity
A grade 6 engineering station rotation where teams score competing constructed-wetland design options on a rubric, then combine the best features into one class design.
Grade 8 Classroom activity
Cloverbank's Cloudy River: A Coagulation Jar-Test Design Challenge
A grade 8 engineering activity where teams design a coagulant recipe on a points budget, test it on muddy water, and iterate to reach the clearest cup.
Projects
Grade 7 Project
Ravensgill Creek Shade Structures: Cooling a Trout Reach
A five-session grade 7 build-and-test project where teams design bank shade structures on a model reach, run three timed heat trials, and combine the best features.
Grade 8 Project
Tarnholt Lagoon Aeration: Model, Test, and Refine a Retrofit
A five-session grade 8 project where teams build tabletop lagoon models, test three air-delivery layouts for dead zones, and recommend a retrofit to a village board.
Quizzes & test questions
Grade 8 Quiz & test questions
Culverton's Flooded Underpass: A Stormwater Design Assessment
A grade 8 assessment mixing multiple-choice, computation, and design short-answer items on reducing runoff, using the rational method and scientific notation.
Graphic organizers
Grade 7 Graphic organizer
Fernlow Lagoon Polishing Filter: Combining Test Results
A grade 7 organizer for reading three media-bed test results, naming the feature worth keeping from each, and stacking those features into one combined filter design.
Grade 8 Graphic organizer
Haverlea Rain Tank Diverters: Combining Three Tested Designs
A grade 8 organizer for comparing three tested rain-tank diverters one feature at a time, then combining the best chamber, screen, and reset into a single design.