Unit 1: Human Impact on the Environment

Performance Expectations:

• MS-ESS3-3: Apply scientific principles to design a method for monitoring and minimizing a human impact on the environment.

• MS-ESS3-4: Construct an argument supported by evidence for how increases in human population and per-capita consumption of natural resources impact Earth's systems.

• MS-ETS1-1: Define the criteria and constraints of a design problem with sufficient precision to ensure a successful solution, taking into account relevant scientific principles and potential impacts on people and the natural environment that may limit possible solutions.

• MS-ETS1-2: Evaluate competing design solutions using a systematic process to determine how well they meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.

• MS-ETS1-3: Analyze data from tests to determine similarities and differences among several design solutions to identify the best characteristics of each that can be combined into a new solution to better meet the criteria for success.

Essential Questions:

• How do human activities impact Earth's systems and the availability of natural resources?

• How do changes in Earth's systems impact human society?

• How do engineers design solutions to environmental problems?

• How do engineers evaluate the success of design solutions?

Disciplinary Core Ideas, Science & Engineering Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, Supporting Standards:

• • MS-ESS3-3

  • MS-ESS3-4

  • MS-ETS1-1

  • MS-ETS1-2

  • MS-ETS1-3

Concepts & Skills:

The students will be able to...

1. Use scientific knowledge to generate design solutions.

• • Given a problem related to human impact on the environment, students use scientific information and principles to generate a design solution that addresses the results of the particular human activity and incorporates technologies that can be used to monitor and minimize negative effects that human activities have on the environment.

  • Students identify relationships between the human activity and the negative environmental impact based on scientific principles, and distinguish between causal and correlational relationships to facilitate the design of the solution.

2. Describe criteria and constraints, including quantification when appropriate.

• • Students define and quantify when appropriate, criteria and constraints for the solution, including: Individual or societal needs and desires, and constraints imposed by economic conditions (e.g., costs of building and maintaining the solution).

3. Evaluate potential solutions.

• • Students describe how well the solution meets the criteria and constraints, including monitoring or minimizing a human impact based on the causal relationships between relevant scientific principles about the processes that occur in, as well as among, Earth Systems and the human impact on the environment.

  • Students identify limitations of the use of technologies employed by the solution.