Networks (Structure & Dynamics)
The hidden web connecting people, web pages, and neurons, and the simple rules that govern how things spread.
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Big Idea
How Computing Works
Grade bands
K-2 · 3-5 · 6-8 · 9-12
AI literacy pillar
How AI works · Ethics
Lesson overview
The hidden web connecting people, web pages, and neurons, and the simple rules that govern how things spread. This module climbs from an everyday intuition to the real mechanism, then names the Stanford course it descends from.
Teacher script · ~45 min
- 0–5
Hook
Friendships, web links, power grids, the spread of a rumor: all are networks: dots (people, pages) joined by lines (relationships). Drawing the connections reveals patterns invisible in any single dot, like who's influential or how fast something will spread. The shape of the web is the story.
- 5–15
Explore
Students do the activity in pairs: Trace how few introductions it'd take to reach a celebrity through people you know. Usually shockingly few: that's the small-world effect.
- 15–30
Explain
Diseases, ideas, and trends spread along network links, and tiny changes in connectivity flip outcomes from 'fizzles out' to 'goes global': a tipping point. The same math models epidemics, viral marketing, and bank-failure cascades. Understanding structure lets you predict and even steer the spread.
- 30–40
Connect to the summit
Show students this is the real thing professionals build: MS&E135, the real thing. The hidden web connecting people, web pages, and neurons, and the simple rules that govern how things spread.
- 40–45
Check
Run the formative check below. Anyone who can explain a key term in their own words has it.
Student activity
Trace how few introductions it'd take to reach a celebrity through people you know. Usually shockingly few: that's the small-world effect.
Slides
Formative check
- 1.In your own words, what is "Node & edge"? (Looking for: A node is a thing (person, page); an edge is a connection between two of them.)
- 2.In your own words, what is "Hub"? (Looking for: A node with unusually many connections that holds the network together.)
- 3.In your own words, what is "Centrality"? (Looking for: A measure of how important or influential a node is in the network.)
Carry-away concepts
- Node & edge
- A node is a thing (person, page); an edge is a connection between two of them.
- Hub
- A node with unusually many connections that holds the network together.
- Centrality
- A measure of how important or influential a node is in the network.
- Contagion / cascade
- How something spreads node-to-node, sometimes tipping into a global wave.
From the summit · the Stanford source
You study network structure and dynamics: graph models, centrality, contagion, and how connectivity shapes outcomes.
This module descends from MS&E135 at Stanford. Students who climb the full ladder arrive here.