Science
Unit: Science - Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems September/October
How do organisms interact with the living and nonliving environments to obtain matter and energy?
Students will understand that:
Animals depend on their surroundings to get what they need, including food, water, shelter, and a favorable temperature. Animals depend on plants or other animals for food. They use their senses to find food and water, and they use their body parts to gather, catch, eat, and chew the food. Plants depend on air, water, minerals (in the soil), and light to grow. Animals can move around, but plants cannot, and they often depend on animals for pollination or to move their seeds around. Different plants survive better in different settings because they have varied needs for water, minerals, and sunlight.
Questions for Students:
Why is there a variety of life on Earth?
How do living and nonliving things effect each other?
How are structure and function related in living things?
What is biodiversity, how do humans affect it, and how does it affect humans?
Unit Science: Earth's Systems: Processes that Shape the Earth January
Students will understand that:
Some events on Earth occur in cycles, like day and night, and others have a beginning and an end, like a volcanic eruption. Some events, like an earthquake, happen very quickly; others, such as the formation of the Grand Canyon, occur very slowly, over a time period much longer than one can observe. Wind and water can change the shape of the land. The resulting landforms, together with the materials on the land, provide homes for living things. Rocks, soils, and sand are present in most areas where plants and animals live. There may also be rivers, streams, lakes, and ponds. Water is found in the ocean, rivers, lakes, and ponds. Water exists as solid ice and in liquid form. It carries soil and rocks from one place to another and determines the variety of life forms that can live in a particular location.
Questions for students:
How do Earth’s major systems interact?
Why do the continents move, and what causes earthquakes and volcanoes?
How do the properties and movements of water shape Earth’s surface and affect its systems?
How can the various proposed design solutions be compared and improved?
Unit: Science - Structure and Properties of Matter March/April
Students will understand that:
Different kinds of matter exist (e.g., wood, metal, water), and many of them can be either solid or liquid, depending on temperature. Matter can be described and classified by its observable properties (e.g., visual, aural, textural), by its uses, and by whether it occurs naturally or is manufactured. Different properties are suited to different purposes. A great variety of objects can be built up from a small set of pieces (e.g., blocks, construction sets). Objects or samples of a substance can be weighed, and their size can be described and measured. (Boundary: volume is introduced only for liquid measure.) Heating or cooling a substance may cause changes that can be observed. Sometimes these changes are reversible (e.g., melting and freezing), and sometimes they are not (e.g., baking a cake, burning fuel).
Questions for Students:
How do particles combine to form the variety of matter one observes?
How do substances combine or change (react) to make new substances? How does one characterize and explain these reactions and make predictions about them?