Co-Evolution of Earth & Life

Driving Questions:

  • How do natural disasters impact life?
  • Are plate tectonics essential for life?
  • What creates diversity?
  • If the past shaped the present, can it help us predict the future?
  • If the natural world operates today as it did in the past, will it continue to do so in the future?
  • Is there a connection between the evolution of earth's systems and the evolution of life on earth?

Big Idea:In this unit students will explore the interactions of earth’s systems (Interpreting the Past, Predicting the Future-A Changing Earth) to determine how a changing earth drives evolution. (Evolution of Change). Geo Biology is the study of how organisms have influenced, and been influenced by, the Earth's environment. Movement of the earth’s continental plates could be a major driver of evolutionary change in all life. Students will explore the theory of plate tectonics and examine how environmental (and atmospheric) changes due to tectonic activity have impacted life through time. They will look at evidence that supports plate tectonics theory and examine past extinction events. Students will then explore how physical characteristics of organisms are influenced by heritable genes and analyze and interpret data that allows them to explain the process of speciation. They will use their previous knowledge of DNA to explain how environmental factors and random mutations of genetic code can be used to explain diversity of organisms. Finally they will examine how environmental changes due to tectonic activity might influence which characteristics (and genes) are selected for, driving the evolution of organisms over time.

Study Focus: Evidence for the Theory of Plate Tectonics, geologic features (trenches, mid-ocean ridges, continental build up) paleomagnetic reversals, plate velocity data, seismic waves, composition and viscosity of magma, genetic processes, molecular/comparative anatomy, fossil record, embryology, natural selection, adaptations, evolution of life.


Standards Addressed:

Biology

HS-LS4-1: Communicate scientific information that common ancestry and biological evolution are supported by multiple lines of empirical evidence.

HS-LS4-2: Construct an explanation based on evidence that the process of evolution primarily results from four factors: (1) the potential for a species to increase in number, (2) the heritable genetic variation of individuals in a species due to mutation and sexual reproduction, (3) competition for limited resources, and (4) the proliferation of those organisms that are better able to survive and reproduce in the environment.

HS-LS4-3: Apply concepts of statistics and probability to support explanations that organisms with an advantageous heritable traittend to increase in proportion to organisms lacking this trait.

HS-LS4-4: Construct an explanation based on evidence for how natural selection leads to adaptations of populations.

HS-LS4-5: Evaluate the evidence supporting claims that changes in environmental conditions may result in (1) increases in the number of individuals of some species, (2) the emergence of new species over time, and (3) the extinction of other species.

HS-LS4-6: Create or revise a simulation to test a solution to mitigate adverse impacts of human activity on biodiversity.


Earth Science

HS-ESS2-1: Develop a model to illustrate how Earth’s internal and surface processes operate at different spatial and temporal scales to form continental and ocean-floor features.

HS-ESS2-2: Analyze geoscience data to make the claim that one change to Earth's surface can create feedbacks that cause changes to other Earth systems

HS-ESS2-3:Develop a model based on evidence of Earth’s interior to describe the cycling of matter by thermal convection.

HS-ESS2-5:Plan and conduct an investigation of the properties of water and its effects on Earth materials and surface processes.

HS-ESS2-6:Develop a quantitative model to describe the cycling of carbon among the hydrosphere, atmosphere, geosphere, and biosphere.

HS-ESS2-7:Construct an argument based on evidence about the simultaneous coevolution of Earth’s systems and life on Earth.