NOVA Labs for Educators

Labs in the Classroom

There are many ways to bring NOVA Labs into your classroom, after school program, day camp, or other educational program. Every Lab presents a particular subject and allows teens to develop their own questions and investigations around that subject. 

Each Lab includes an activity where you will explore a new data set and/or scientific phenomenon. While the challenges will vary—some being more open-ended, others being more structured and game-like—they will all encourage users to conduct their own scientific analyses and investigations. 

Videos

Each Lab comes with a collection of free videos that provide the background information that will help users succeed in the Lab's research challenge. The concepts explored in these videos range from the basic to the more nuanced and complex. Together, they are intended to give users a solid foundation in the relevant scientific principles and an understanding of why each area of research matters. All the Lab videos can be found here.

Opportunities and Resources

For each Lab, we provide a list of related opportunities and career exploration resources relevant to teens. Teens will find internships, scholarship, science competitions, and other ways to stay involved in science on the “Opportunities” page. 

Community and Social Feed

In addition to making new content and data available and accessible, NOVA Labs provides an online community on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, in which you can share, ask questions, or learn about recent observations or ideas that have come up in the various fields of research.

An Educator Guide

For each Lab, we provide additional ideas and materials for educators that are specific to that Lab and subject area.  Here you can find education resources specific to the Energy Lab, Sun Lab, Cloud Lab, RNA Lab, Cybersecurity Lab, and Evolution Lab.