Science as Inquiry

• Plan and conduct a simple investigation.
• Employ simple equipment and tools to gather data and extend the senses.
• Use data to construct a reasonable explanation.
• Ask a question about objects, organisms, and events in the environment.
• Communicate investigations and explanations.

Understandings about scientific inquiry

• Scientific investigations involve asking and answering a question and comparing the answer with what scientists already know about the world.
• Scientists use different kinds of investigations, depending on the questions they are trying to answer.
• Simple instruments, such as magnifiers, provide more information than scientists obtain using only their senses.
• Scientists develop explanations using observations (evidence) and what they already know about the world (scientific knowledge).
• Scientists make the results of their investigations public; they describe the investigations in ways that enable others to repeat the investigations.
• Scientists review and ask questions about the results of other scientists’ work.

Properties of objects and materials

• Objects have many observable properties, including size, weight, shape, color, and the ability to react with other substances.
• Objects can be described by the properties of the materials from which they are made, and those properties can be used to separate or sort a group of objects or materials.

Life Science

The characteristics of organisms

• Organisms have basic needs.
• Each plant or animal has different structures that serve different functions.

Organisms and their environments

• An organism’s patterns of behavior are related to the nature of that organism’s environment, including the kinds and numbers of other organisms present, the availability of food and resources, and the physical characteristics of the environment.
• All organisms can cause change in the environment in which they live. Some of these changes are beneficial. Others are detrimental.

Earth and Space Science

Properties of earth materials

• Earth materials are solid rocks and soils, water, and the gases of the atmosphere. The varied materials have different physical and chemical properties which make them useful in different ways, for example, as resources for growing plants.
• Soils have properties of color and texture, capacity to retain water, and ability to support growth of plants.

Science and Technology

Abilities of technological design

• Identify a simple problem.
• Propose a solution.
• Implement proposed solutions.
• Evaluate a product or design.
• Communicate a problem, design, and solution.

Understandings about science and technology

• Science is one way of answering questions and explaining the natural world.
• Scientists and engineers work in teams.
• Women and men of all ages, backgrounds, and groups engage in a variety of scientific and technological work.
• Tools help scientists make better observations and measurements. They help scientists see, measure, and do things they could not otherwise see, measure, and do.

Science as a human endeavor

• Science and technology have been practiced by people for a long time.
• Men and women have made a variety of contributions throughout history of science and technology.

Unifying Concepts and Processes

Systems, order, and organization

Evidence, models, and explanation

Constancy, change, and measurement

Form and function and measurement