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The sympathetic nervous system — our fight-or-flight response — kicks in when we face a big challenge or risk. When we’re relaxed, our parasympathetic nervous system takes over. Together these two systems make up the autonomic nervous system.

Use these lesson plans paired to articles from the June/July issue of Science News Explores to have students analyze data visualizations from Analyze This articles, get a template to use the KWL literacy practice with your students and learn how to hula hoop using physics principles.

Scientists built hula-hooping robots to answer an old mystery: How does a Hula Hoop stay up? Learn how best to launch and maintain a circulating hoop — and then explore how specific shapes can turn gyrations into a gravity-defying force. You can apply those concepts to then predict the hula-hooping success of other shapes.

Use this lesson plan to learn about an article type called Analyze This that is published by Science News Explores in print and online. You can also access a lesson plan template that can be used with any Analyze This article. Each Analyze This article includes a graph or data visualization that is paired with questions for students to answer and a short story that provides context.

Use this lesson plan and the provided template to have your students practice the KWL strategy. This note-taking strategy helps students organize their thoughts and reflect on their knowledge around a particular reading.

Over the past two decades, electricity from renewable sources, such as wind and solar, has been on the rise. Devices known as grid-forming inverters will likely play a major role in getting renewable energy safely into the power grid.

Fossil research has been plagued by parachute paleontology. This happens when scientists from high-income countries travel to low-income countries to study or collect fossils but don’t involve local experts. Sometimes foreign scientists skirt local laws about exporting fossils or buy them under sketchy or even illegal circumstances.

Pair these lesson plans with articles from the May issue of Science News to have students compare observational and experimental study designs and propose their own research topic for one of them, and explore how scientists are developing taste-mimicking virtual-reality (VR) technology.

Virtual reality (VR) has expanded people's ability to experience visual and auditory sensations in virtual worlds. What about our other senses? Learn how chemical-detection capabilities of the tongue allow us to taste cake as being sweet and lemonade as being sour. Explore how scientists used this understanding to develop taste-mimicking VR technology, all while answering questions about how this tasty research might one day help people.

In this lesson, students will compare and contrast observational studies with experimental studies and practice identifying the study types from provided examples. Then, they will apply that knowledge to two studies outlined in Science News articles. As an optional assignment, students will be asked to create an example of a possible study.

To really understand Earth, you need to travel thousands of kilometers beneath our feet. Starting at the center, Earth is composed of four distinct layers.

Check out these lesson plans paired to articles from the May issue of Science News Explores to learn how eyelashes’ properties and structure help them repel water from eyes and use examples of fossils to explore the evolutionary relationship between birds and dinosaurs.