Lesson Package | NGSS STEM Engineering Challenges

This NGSS STEM Engineering Challenges resource engages students in grades 3–5 with eight hands-on activities that use simple, inexpensive materials to teach design thinking, fair testing, and variables. Each challenge includes a 5E lesson plan, slideshow, response page, and photos of student work to guide instruction. Students design, test, and improve prototypes while practicing critical thinking, collaboration, communication, and creativity. This resource is ideal for classrooms, STEM camps, or science programs, helping students explore real-world problem-solving through fun engineering challenges such as building bridges, ziplines, and balloon rescues.

Standards

3-5-ETS1-1. Define a simple design problem reflecting a need or a want that includes specified criteria for success and constraints on materials, time, or cost.

3-5-ETS1-2. Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.

3-5-ETS1-3. Plan and carry out fair tests in which variables are controlled and failure points are considered to identify aspects of a model or prototype that can be improved.