Fundamental Concepts and Principles Addressed (5-8)

Earth and Space Science

Structure of the earth system

• The solid earth is layered with a lithosphere; hot, convecting mantle; and dense, metallic core.
• Lithospheric plates on the scales of continents and oceans constantly move at rates of centimeters per year in response to movements in the mantle. Major geological events, such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and mountain building, result from these plate motions.
• Land forms are the result of a combination of constructive and destructive forces. Constructive forces include crustal deformation, volcanic eruption, and deposition of sediment.
• Some changes in the earth can be described as the “rock cycle.” Old rocks at the earth’s surface weather, forming sediments that are buried, then compacted, heated, then often recrystallized into new rock. Eventually, those new rocks may be brought to the surface by the forces that drive plate motions, and the rock cycle continues.
• Water, which covers the majority of the earth’s surface, circulates through the crust, oceans, and atmosphere in what is known as the “water cycle.”
• The atmosphere is a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen, and trace gases that include water vapor. The atmosphere has different properties at different elevations.
• Clouds, formed by the condensation of water vapor, affect weather and climate.
• Global patterns of atmospheric movement influence local weather. Oceans have a major effect on climate, because water in the oceans holds a large amount of heat.
• Living organisms have played many roles in the earth’s system, including affecting the composition of the atmosphere, producing some types of rocks, and contributing to the weathering of rocks.

Earth’s history

The earth processes we see today, including erosion, movement of lithospheric plates, and changes in atmospheric composition, are similar to those that occurred in the past. Earth history is also influenced by occasional catastrophes.

Earth in the solar system

The sun is the major source of energy for phenomena on the earth’s surface, such as ocean currents and the water cycle.

Science as Inquiry

Abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry

• Identify questions that can be answered through scientific investigations.
• Design and conduct a scientific investigation.
• Use appropriate tools and techniques to gather, analyze, and interpret data.
• Develop descriptions, explanations, predictions, and models using evidence.
• Think critically and logically to make the relationships between evidence and explanations.
• Recognize and analyze alternative explanations and predictions.
• Communicate scientific procedures and explanations.
• Use mathematics in all aspects of scientific inquiry.

Understandings about scientific inquiry

• Scientists use different kinds of investigations, depending on the questions they are trying to answer.
• Current scientific knowledge and understanding guide scientific investigations.
• Mathematics is important in all aspects of scientific inquiry.
• Technology used to gather data enhances accuracy and allows scientists to analyze and quantify results of investigations.
• Scientific explanations emphasize evidence.
• Asking questions and querying others’ explanations is part of scientific inquiry.
• Scientific investigations sometimes result in new ideas for study or generate new methods for investigation.

Science and Technology

Abilities of technological design

• Identify appropriate problems for technological design.
• Design a solution or product.
• Implement a proposed design.

Understandings about science and technology

• Many different people in different cultures have made and continue to make contributions to science and technology.
• Science and technology are reciprocal.
• Perfectly designed solutions do not exist. All technological solutions have trade-offs, such as safety, cost, efficiency, and appearance.

Science in Personal and Social Perspectives

Natural hazards

• Internal and external processes of the earth system cause natural hazards, events that change or destroy human and wildlife habitats, damage property, and harm or kill humans. Natural hazards include earthquakes, landslides, wildfires, volcanic eruptions, floods, storms, and asteroid impacts.
• Natural hazards can present personal and societal challenges.

Risks and benefits

• Risk analysis considers the type of hazard and estimates the number of people that might be exposed and the number likely to suffer consequences. The results are used to determine the options for reducing or eliminating risks.
• Students should understand the risks associated with natural hazards, (fires, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions).

History and Nature of Science

Science as a human endeavor

• Women and men of various backgrounds engage in the activities of science. Some scientists work in teams and some work alone, but all communicate extensively with others.
• Science requires different abilities, depending on such factors as the field of study and type of inquiry.

Nature of science

• Scientists formulate and test their explanations using observations, experiments, and mathematical models. Scientists do and have changed their ideas about nature when they encounter new experimental evidence that does not match their existing explanations.
• is normal for scientists to differ with one another about the interpretation of the evidence or theory being considered.
• It is part of scientific inquiry to evaluate the results of scientific investigations.

History of Science

• Many individuals have contributed to the traditions of science.
• In historical practice, science has been practiced by different individuals in different cultures. In looking at the history of many peoples, one finds that scientists and engineers of high achievement are considered to be among the most valued contributors to their culture.
• Tracing the history of science can show how difficult it was for scientific innovators to break through the accepted ideas of their time to reach the conclusions that we currently take for granted.

Unifying Concepts and Processes

Evidence, model, and explanation

Constancy, change, and measurement

Form and function