Hagerstown Community College’s Mobile Microscopy Training Hub (mMTH) brings materials, equipment, expertise, and science lessons focused on microscopy to K-12 classrooms. We are working with K-12 classroom teachers to create and co-present hands-on, inquiry-based science lessons aligned with the Maryland State K-12 science curriculum to students. Each lesson has been designed to help students learn how to use magnifying tools such as microscopes to explore the microscopic world around them. The lessons teach students how to use magnifying tools to explore specific topics aligned with Maryland State Curriculum learning goals. Each lesson also focuses on teaching students about the nature of science. Students ask questions, form hypotheses, gather and record data, and come to conclusions. The worksheets associated with the lessons also encourage critical thinking and writing skills, and sometimes some basic math to calculate total magnification to support evidence-based learning. Teachers are encouraged to modify or augment the lessons to make better connections between the content presented in the lesson and their class’ learning goals.

Teachers local to Hagerstown Community College are encouraged to invite the Mobile Microscopy Training Hub to co-teach a lesson in their classrooms. These teachers will then be eligible to borrow equipment and supplies to present future lessons in their own classrooms independently and/or with support from our staff.

Teachers not in the local area are welcome to download any of the lessons we have on this website for classroom use. Several lessons for K-12 have been piloted with thousands of local students and are available for download and use. Suggestions to improve these lessons or for future lessons are always welcome.

To learn more about or download the HCC mMTH Lessons currently available, click on the link to the lessons below:

For Elementary School

• Fingerprints: What makes us different?
• Wildlife CSI: Using forensic hair analysis to solve a crime in the forest
• Small Organisms: Using microscopes to learn about small organisms
• Snail Eggs: Tracking the development of a snail embryo from ball of cells to beating heart
• Plant Parts: Roots, stems, leaves, and flowers – how are they different?
• Fun with microscopes!: A gallery activity for the very young
• Microscopes!: An introduction to microscopes and cells, including where the cell got its name
• Brine Shrimp: Larvae and Life Cycles, the life of a Brine Shrimp
• Sands Around the World: Do sands from different sources look the same and why?
• Solving Mysteries with Sand
• Sediment or Soil: Forensic analysis of sand Geodes
• Fossils of Maryland
• Insects

For Middle School

• Wildlife CSI: Using forensic hair analysis to solve a crime in the forest
• Plant Parts: Roots, stems, leaves, and flowers – how are they different?
• Snail Eggs: Tracking the development of a snail embryo from ball of cells to beating heart
• Introduction to Microscopes: What are they good for?

For High School

• Experimenting with Snail Eggs: Designing experiments to learn more about environmental effects on snails
• Introduction to Microscopes: What are they good for?
• Wildlife CSI: Using forensic hair analysis to solve a crime in the forest
• Who Killed Professor Plum? Using microscopy and forensic science to solve a crime
• Domains & Kingdoms: Taxonomy of Cells
• Investigating the Microscopic World: Designing authentic experiments using microscopy
• Let’s Look at Our Own Cells: Why cytological stains are important in microscopy
• Cell Taxonomy: An introduction to cells and tissues
• Cell Taxonomy: How are organisms grouped?
• Snail Eggs & Embryology

Microscopy Education Resources

Many of these classroom lessons were inspired by the book, Microscopic Explorations: A GEMS Festival Guide by Susan Brady, Carolyn Willard, Lincoln Bergman and Carl Babcock. 1998. Lawrence Hall of Science, University of California, Berkeley. You can find out more about this guide to creating a microscopy festival at http://lhsgems.org/GEMmicro.html.

• Microscopy Society of America’s Project MICRO K-12 outreach
• Nikon’s Microscopy Education
• Hitachi’s Inspire STEM Education
• American Society for Microbiology K-12 Outreach
• Virtual microscope lessons from Stanford
• Microscope activities for home and school from Great Scopes
• An atlas of microscopic images
• American Society of Cell Biology's The Cell: An Image Library

This program is supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation Grant # 1205050 and by Hagerstown Community College.