Grade 5
Unit 2: Cooler communties
Essential Question: How can we make our communities cooler?
Project Description: Students embark on a journey of discovery, innovation, and action to understand global change in our communities. Students learn how Earth systems interact and use systems thinking to model their understanding of global change using the Understanding Global Change (UGC) framework. They collect data on land surface temperatures and vegetation in their communities and research how humans impact land surface temperatures. As climate champions, students design community maps that cultivate a cooler community for the future.
next generation science standards
Performance Expectations
5-ESS2-1. Develop a model using an example to describe ways the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and/or atmosphere interact. [Clarification Statement: Examples could include the influence of the ocean on ecosystems, landform shape, and climate; the influence of the atmosphere on landforms and ecosystems through weather and climate; and the influence of mountain ranges on winds and clouds in the atmosphere. The geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere are each a system.] [Assessment Boundary: Assessment is limited to the interactions of two systems at a time.]
5-ESS3-1. Obtain and combine information about ways individual communities use science ideas to protect the Earth’s resources and environment.
5-PS1-3. Make observations and measurements to identify materials based on their properties. [Clarification Statement: Examples of materials to be identified could include baking soda and other powders, metals, minerals, and liquids. Examples of properties could include color, hardness, reflectivity, electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, response to magnetic forces, and solubility; density is not intended as an identifiable property.] [Assessment Boundary: Assessment does not include density or distinguishing mass and weight.]