What if you could challenge your 11th graders to gain an understanding of the feats of engineering required to build high-rise buildings—and maybe even improve them? With this volume in the STEM Road Map Curriculum Series, you can! Construction Materials outlines a journey that will steer your students toward authentic problem solving while grounding them in integrated STEM disciplines. The series is designed to meet the growing need to infuse real-world learning into Kû12 classrooms. This book is an interdisciplinary module that uses project- and problem-based learning. It gives students an inside look at the complex technologies and science behind the buildings they may take for granted. They’ll examine micro- and macro-properties of construction materials, particularly those of high-rise buildings, through a unit divided into three sections that explore the following: 1.How high-rises are constructed, their influence on society, and how to communicate complex ideas clearly; 2.The factors involved in the collapse of the World Trade Center’s twin towers in New York, with a focus on how engineers use structural failures to learn more about the designed world; 3.Construction innovations that will prompt your students to propose new ways to construct high-rises. The STEM Road Map Curriculum Series is anchored in the Next Generation Science Standards, the Common Core State Standards, and the Framework for 21st Century Learning. In-depth and flexible, Construction Materials can be used as a whole unit or in part to meet the needs of districts, schools, and teachers who are charting a course toward an integrated STEM approach.