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Invention Education Curricula
As the InventEd Network continues to grow, more content and curricula is available for sharing. Please use the sorting tool below to find a collection of curricula, available for all grade bands, published by Invention Education program providers.
Oregon State University
The Oregon State University (OSU) Office of Precollege Programs provides programs designed to increase that target Oregon's youth. Their website contains useful information that could be useful to teachers and students nationwide.
Design Squad Global (DSG)
12-Week DSG Inventing Green Club Guide
The Inventing Green club guide provides information that would allow you to conduct a 6 or 12-week club based on an environmental sustainability theme.
Design Squad Global (DSG)
6-Week DSG Inventing Green Club Guide
The Inventing Green club guide provides information that would allow you to conduct a 6 or 12-week club based on an environmental sustainability theme.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Build a Better Pencil
Students develop an awareness of constraints. Children may be inclined to go with their first idea with little testing. Students are introduced to a problem with pencils, design to solve the problem and reflect on the practicality of their designs.
Oregon State University
Build a Boat for Scientific Research
Students build a boat for scientific research. In the process they learn about buoyancy, boat design, and tradeoffs to meet needs/goals (speed, stability, weight, and space). The Zip file contains lessons for elementary, middle and high school.
Oregon State University
Chemical Reaction Powered Car
Students design a car powered by the chemical reaction of baking soda and vinegar. The goal in this design activity is use a chemical reaction to convert chemical energy into kinetic energy.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Collectible Cards
Inventor Trading Cards feature caricatures of inventors of diverse backgrounds who hold patents and are distributed in an effort to encourage and inspire future generations of inventors. Some activities related to the inventions featured are linked.
Conrad Foundation
Conrad Design Method® : No Box Toolbox
The Conrad Design Method is a framework for teams and coaches to understand innovative and entrepreneurial solutions using methods modeled by google and other leading companies.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Design an invention to keep first responders safe
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students learn how first responders face dangerous and how technology can offer greater protection to save lives. Students use the invention process from design to intellectual property protection.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Design Challenge: Water Transport
In this third lesson, students build out their model(s) developed in the second lesson and apply knowledge of social need and cultural constraints from the first lesson to fabricate one or more prototypes. They then test them in a design challenge.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Designing a Building Using Passive Solar Energy
This is the second in a series of three lessons that focus on the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels. Students learn how building design, construction, and location can mitigate the use of energy for heating and cooling.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Fake social media accounts could influence voting
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students examine how the invention of the bot on social media websites like Twitter plays a role in influencing public opinion. Students will then invent their own bot to spread awareness about an issue they care about.
AAAS Science Netlinks
From Woodpeckers to Water: Designing Models to Ease Freshwater Access Crisis
This lesson is the second of a series of three lessons that focuses on the issue of the lack of access to safe drinking water. Students build and evaluate prototypes for water transport in a design challenge using a number of evaluation criteria.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Girl Scout Brownie Badge: Imagination Pioneer
The Girl Scout Brownie Inventor badge teaches how to think like an inventor. The IP patch requires learning about the tools that allow inventors to benefit from their inventions while also sharing them with others.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Girl Scout Cadet Badge: Investigating Possiblities
The Girl Scout Cadette Entrepreneur badge inspires how to think like an entrepreneur. The IP patch requires learning how to add value to a business by using intellectual property to promote and protect an invention.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Girl Scout Junior Badge: Inventive Products
The Girl Scout Junior Inventive Products badge highlights how inventions can improve lives.The IP patch requires learning about intellectual property protection and how it protects owners and inspires others to improve and invent.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Girl Scout Senior Badge: Inspiration Producers
The Girl Scout Senior Social Innovator badge involves the identification of a social problem and development of a solution. The IP patch requires demonstration of how intellectual property helps protect and promote innovation.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Help solve the Earth’s plastic problem
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students explore ways to reduce plastic waste and develop solutions to the Earth’s plastic problem. They will also design an invention to cut down on plastic waste in their school, home and community.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Help your loved ones monitor health at home through invention
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students explore ways to use household items or routines to monitor health conditions for at-risk patients. They design an invention that monitors one health indicator or vital sign.
PBS NewsHour Extra
How “impact inventing” could fight Lyme Disease
In this lesson, students watch the PBS NewsHour video, “Could genetically engineered mice reduce Lyme disease?” and learn how impact inventing might help solve this public health problem.
PBS NewsHour Extra
How animals help us design new inventions
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students will learn how farm animals serve as ecosystem engineers to improve the output of solar energy farms. Students will design their own invention to improve an environmental problem using an eco-based solution.
PBS NewsHour Extra
How inventions are saving sea turtles
In this NewsHour lesson, students learn how wildlife conservationists in Costa Rica are teaming up with law enforcement to catch poachers by using 3D-printed plastic eggs with GPS trackers. Students will design prototypes to help solve this issue.
PBS NewsHour Extra
How inventions will land humans on Mars
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, using the invention process, students explore solutions to some of the problems facing the Mars mission and decide whether or not they are on board with expanding humankind’s reach in the universe.
PBS NewsHour Extra
How mimicking nature inspires new inventions
In this NewsHour lesson, students learn about biomimicry in which nature inspires new inventions to solve some of the world’s toughest problems. Students design their own invention using biomimicry to solve a problem.
Oregon State University
Human Centered Design: Masks and Backpacks
Students use Human Centered Design (HCD) to make personal protective masks. They will then be the “user” of the mask they design. Students document their thinking while using HCD, and show how HCD informed their solution.
Project Invent
Idea Selection and Prototyping - Digital Curriculum
This digital curriculum features 7 lesson plans and 30+ tools from design thinking, engineering, and entrepreneurship to guide students through solving real problems with technology.
Michelson Institute for IP
Intellectual Property Resources
The Michelson Institute for IP presents Intellectual Property resources that are accessible to learners. There is an engaging series of resources for the layperson in the Intangible Advantage IP book and video series.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Invent an app that helps your community
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students learn about how several young entrepreneurs in California’s rural Salinas Valley invented apps to boost the economy and bring about new jobs in their community. Students design an app that helps their community.
Design Squad Global (DSG)
Invent It, Build It Guide
The Design Squad Global Invent It, Build It Guide provides hands-on engineering activities, videos, and lesson plans. Afterschool programs and events are also available.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Invent your own device to battle invasive species
Students learn about the invention process and research an invasive species. They then design their own invention to help deal with the environmental impact of these invasive species.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Inventing “assistive technology devices”
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students learn about assistive devices and how innovation plays a key role in the invention process. Students will learn how 3D printed prosthetics are changing lives. They will design their own assistive technology.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Inventing beyond recycling
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students watch the PBS news story “Why it will take more than just recycling to cut back on plastic." Students invent designs that incorporate recyclable or non-recyclable items.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Inventing in a pandemic for the tiniest among us
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students learn how pandemics require many resources, including personal protective equipment in order to prevent infection. Students will use the invention process to create an infant face shield.
Lemelson-MIT
Inventing Merit Badge
Lemelson-MIT Program partnered with the Boy Scouts of American to encourage Scouts to be inventive and solve real-world problems. The Merit Badge resource provides a path to invention for students.
Lemelson-MIT
Inventing Merit Badge
Lemelson-MIT partnered with the Boy Scouts of American to encourage Scouts to be inventive and solve real-world problems. The merit badge demonstrates the impact and importance of inventive thinking. This resource may be used to an invention activity.
Henry Ford Invention Convention Worldwide
Invention Convention Worldwide Grades 3-5 Curriculum
Students will explore invention through a series of steps including identifying, understanding, ideating, designing, building, testing and communicating. Grade level appropriate curriculum documents and resources are provided.
Henry Ford Invention Convention Worldwide
Invention Convention Worldwide Grades 6-8 Curriculum
Students will explore invention through a series of steps including identifying, understanding, ideating, designing, building, testing and communicating. Grade level appropriate curriculum documents and resources are provided.
Henry Ford Invention Convention Worldwide
Invention Convention Worldwide Grades 9-12 Curriculum
Students will explore invention through a series of steps including identifying, understanding, ideating, designing, building, testing and communicating. Grade level appropriate curriculum documents and resources are provided.
Henry Ford Invention Convention Worldwide
Invention Convention Worldwide Grades K-2 Curriculum
Students will explore invention through a series of steps including identifying, understanding, ideating, designing, building, testing and communicating. Grade level appropriate curriculum documents and resources are provided.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Invention Education Teacher Toolkit
The toolkit provides background information about invention education as well as suggestions for discussing inventing and invention education with students.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Inventioneers App
This App requires students to solve the problems and invent by positioning objects on the screen just by touching and dragging them.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Inventions 1: Edison and the Light Bulb
In Inventions 1: Edison and the Light Bulb, students learn how inventions are created to solve problems or improve the way things are done.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Inventions 2: The Impact
In Inventions 2: The Impact, students focus on the process of inventing, particularly on what short- and long-term issues inventors have to consider before developing an invention.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Inventors Coloring Book
The Inventors Coloring Book enables young students to visualize and learn about famous inventors and their inventions.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Is solar power the future of energy?
In this NewsHour lesson, students learn how utility companies and individuals are inventing newer, greener ways to get power. Students create their own electrical circuits using innovative structures designed to save energy.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Chill Out
The JV InvenTeams Chill Out Activity engages students in creative applications of heat and heat transfer and allows them to explore: Build a lunchbox Convection, conduction, and radiation.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Electronic Textiles
The JV InvenTeams Electronic Textiles Activity Guide leads educators and students through creative applications of circuitry. It allows them to explore: How inventors solve problems, basic circuitry, light-up designs, and wearable electronics.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Green Chemistry
The JV InvenTeams Green Chemistry Activity Guide, developed in collaboration with Beyond Benign, enables exploration of topics such as: Sustainability, Bioplastics and Chemical Science.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Noise Makers
The JV InvenTeams Noise Makers Activity Guide will leads educators and students through creative applications of sound. It allows them to explore: How inventors solve problems, sound waves and electromagnetism, and designing an electric pickup.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Pump it Up!
The JV InvenTeams Pump it Up Activity Guide leads educators and students through creative applications of human energy and power and allows them to explore: Human Energy and Human Power, Hydraulics, and Pumps.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Shoe Soles
The JV InvenTeams Shoe Soles Activity Guide leads educators and students through the creative design of shoe soles. It allows them to explore: How inventors solve problems, designing, sculpting and casting molds, and making shoe sole prototypes.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: Super Lens
The JV InvenTeams Super Lens Activity Guide leads educators and students through creative applications of light. It allows them to explore: How inventors solve problems, light rays and lenses, optical calculations, and creating a camera prototype.
Lemelson-MIT
JV InvenTeams: U Control
The JV InvenTeams U Control Activity Guide leads educators and students through creative applications of mechanical systems and general motor science and allows them to explore: Mechanical Systems, Motor Science, Electricity and Circuits.
Lemelson-MIT
Lemelson-MIT Bee the Inventor
"Bee" the Inventor is a 10-page STEAM activity book that teaches kids (ages 6-8) about invention through the role leafcutter bee's play in our environment. Kids learn how to build a bee house prototype for bees, Shagun and Dwij.
Lemelson-MIT
Lemelson-MIT Inventor Handbook
This resource provides a basic overview of intellectual property. The first person to invent a useful, novel, and non-obvious idea is the legal inventor. It's important to understand intellectual property protections as an inventor.
Oregon MESA
Maseeh College Invent Ed Toolbox
This tool is a resource for all educators. In the MESA Invention Toolkit, the teacher is a facilitator of learning. Students develop empathy for a client, define a problem, ideate possible solutions, build and test a prototype, and present.
Oregon State University
Mission Submersible
Students design and build a working model of a ships launch and recovery system using everyday materials. The goal in this design activity is to develop safety features that limit swinging on a moving research vessel.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Mitigating Climate Change through Passive Solar Design
This is the first in a series of three lessons that focus on the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels. Students will be introduced to the concepts of a thermal mass and latent heat.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
Model Rocket Making and Launching Activity
Students learn how to make and launch paper rockets. This activity is inspired by expired United States Patents. Students use their imagination, creativity and design skills while applying Newtons Laws of Motion.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Modeling Passive Solar Homes
This is the third in a series of three lessons that focus on the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels. Students build a prototype of the home they designed during the second lesson that uses passive solar to help decrease the amount of energy used for heating and cooling.
PBS NewsHour Extra
New inventions help people with disabilities
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students learn about a new bio-medical device which allows individuals who cannot physically speak to type sentences by simply thinking. Students create innovative ways to improve upon a medical invention.
Oregon State University
Ocean Engineering Challenge - Helping Hands at the Bottom of the Sea
Students design and build a "Helping Hand" for a ROV that lets you grab different objects and drop them on a ship. Design criteria are used to revise and redesign their "Helping Hand," and evaluate design solutions that best meet the design criteria.
Oregon State University
Ocean Engineering Challenge - Save the Soup
Students design a personal flotation device (PFD) for a can of soup. The PFD must be put on the can by one group member in less than 20 seconds and allow the can to float for more than one minute.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Renewable energy inventions protect environments
In this PBS NewsHour lesson, students explore inventions that harness the power of water to make electricity. Students sketch, model or build an invention that uses renewable energy and helps protect the environment.
AAAS Science Netlinks
Rewriting the World Water Script: Defining the Freshwater Access Crisis
This lesson is the first of a series of three lessons that will culminate in an invention to provide safe drinking water. Students research access to freshwater that is safe to drink in tropical and near-tropical societies.
PBS NewsHour Extra
Solar invention makes safety levels shine
In this PBS lesson, students learn about emerging technologies that have helped inventors seek new settings for light sources in high-poverty parts of the world. Students will invent their own light source using the steps of the invention process.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Design a Spacecraft
Students design a spacecraft with these virtual materials or create their own parts and pieces. Using Tinkercad, they can delete, reshape, duplicate, and create new parts.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Design a Stadium
Students design a stadium with these virtual materials or create their own parts and pieces. Using Tinkercad, they can delete, reshape, duplicate and create new parts.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Help Clean Up the Ocean
Students create a 3D model of an invention that could help clean up the ocean. Using Tinkercad, they can delete, reshape, and duplicate elements - and they can create new parts, too.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Invent a Device That Can Move Through a Pipe
Students invent a device that can move through a pipe with these virtual materials or create their own parts and pieces. Using Tinkercad, they can delete, reshape, duplicate, and create new parts.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Invent a Musical Instrument
Students invent an instrument using common items found around their house. This is a Spark!Lab digital collection. When you get to the download link, you log into "Instructables teachers."
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!lab - Reinvent the Shopping Cart
Students reinvent a shopping cart with these virtual materials or create using their own parts and pieces. Using Tinkercad, they can delete, reshape, and duplicate elements and they can create new parts, too.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!Lab Activities: PERFORM
Activities for the PERFORM theme explore how students can apply creativity to finding solutions to different challenges, environments, needs, and purposes, and to tweaking existing inventions for new uses.
Lemelson Center Smithsonian
Spark!Lab Inventor's Notebook
The Spark!Lab Inventor's Notebook provides a guide for students to engage in the invention process. It is divided up into sections: Think it, Explore it, Sketch it, Create It, Try it, Tweak it and Sell it.
Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics and Computing (CEISMC)
The InVenture Prize Invention Lesson Plans for Grades K-12
Elementary, middle, and high school students are encouraged to work on projects that identify real-world problems and design unique solutions.
US Patent and Trademark Office of Education and Outreach
The Science of Innovation Videos
These videos and lessons were developed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in collaboration with the National Science Foundation and NBC Learn. The series explores innovation through the eyes of scientists, engineers, and inventors.
Oregon State University
Windmills
Students design, build, and test windmills made from various materials. Students learn about renewable energy and energy transfer as well as the engineering process, manipulating variables, and budgeting resources.