5.1 Science Practices: All students will understand that science is both a body of knowledge and an evidence-based, model-building enterprise that continually extends, refines, and revises knowledge. The four Science Practices strands encompass the knowledge and reasoning skills that students must acquire to be proficient in science.
A. Understand Scientific Explanations: Students understand core concepts and principles of science and use measurement and observation tools to assist in categorizing, representing, and interpreting the natural and designed world.
5.1.8.A.1 Demonstrate understanding and use interrelationships among central scientific concepts to revise explanations and to consider alternative explanations. CPI: Core scientific concepts and principles represent the conceptual basis for model-building and facilitate the generation of new and productive questions.
5.1.8.A.2 Use mathematical, physical, and computational tools to build conceptual-based models and to pose theories. CPI: Results of observation and measurement can be used to build conceptual-based models and to search for core explanations.
5.1.8.A.3 Use scientific principles and models to frame and synthesize scientific arguments and pose theories. CPI: Predictions and explanations are revised based on systematic observations, accurate measurements, and structured data/evidence.
B. Generate Scientific Evidence Through Active Investigations:Students master the conceptual, mathematical, physical, and computational tools that need to be applied when constructing and evaluating claims.
5.1.8.B.1 Design investigations and use scientific instrumentation to collect, analyze, and evaluate evidence as part of building and revising models and explanations. CPI: Evidence is generated and evaluated as part of building and refining models and explanations.
5.1.8.B.2 Gather, evaluate, and represent evidence using scientific tools, technologies, and computational strategies. CPI:Mathematics and technology are used to gather, analyze, and communicate results.
5.1.8.B.3 Use qualitative and quantitative evidence to develop evidence-based arguments. CPI Carefully collected evidence is used to construct and defend arguments.
5.1.8.B.4 Use quality controls to examine data sets and to examine evidence as a means of generating and reviewing explanations.CPI Scientific reasoning is used to support scientific conclusions.
C. Reflect on Scientific Knowledge: Scientific knowledge builds on itself over time.
5.1.8.C.1 Scientific models and understandings of fundamental concepts and principles are refined as new evidence is considered. CPI: Monitor one’s own thinking, as understandings of scientific concepts are refined.
5.1.8.C.2 Predictions and explanations are revised to account more completely for available evidence. CPI: Revise predictions or explanations on the basis of discovering new evidence, learning new information, or using models.
5.1.8.C.3 Science is a practice in which an established body of knowledge is continually revised, refined, and extended. CPI: Generate new and productive questions to evaluate and refine core explanations.
D. Participate Productively in Science: The growth of scientific knowledge involves critique and communication, which are åÊsocial practices that are governed by a core set of values and norms.
5.1.8.D.1 Science involves practicing productive social interactions with peers, such as partner talk, whole-group discussions, and small-group work. CPI: Engage in multiple forms of discussion in order to process, make sense of, and learn from others’ ideas, observations, and experiences.
5.1.8.D.2 In order to determine which arguments and explanations are most persuasive, communities of learners work collaboratively to pose, refine, and evaluate questions, investigations, models, and theories (e.g., argumentation, representation, visualization, etc.).CPI: Engage in productive scientific discussion practices during conversations with peers, both face-to-face and virtually, in the context of scientific investigations and model-building.
5.1.8.D.3 Instruments of measurement can be used to safely gather accurate information for making scientific comparisons of objects and events. CPI: Demonstrate how to safely use tools, instruments, and supplies.
5.4 Earth Systems Science: All students will understand that Earth operates as a set of complex, dynamic, and interconnected systems, and is a part of the all-encompassing system of the universe.
D. Tectonics:The theory of plate tectonics provides a framework for understanding the dynamic processes within and on Earth.
5.4.6.D.1 Lithospheric plates consisting of continents and ocean floors move in response to movements in the mantle. CPI: Apply understanding of the motion of lithospheric plates to explain why the Pacific Rim is referred to as the Ring of Fire.
5.4.8.D.1 Earth is layered with a lithosphere, a hot, convecting mantle, and a dense, metallic core. CPI: Model the interactions between the layers of Earth.
5.4.8.D.2Major geological events, such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and mountain building, result from the motion of plates. Sea floor spreading, revealed in mapping of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, and sub-duction zones are evidence for the theory of plate tectonics. CPI: Present evidence to support arguments for the theory of plate motion.
5.4.12.D.1 Convection currents in the upper mantle drive plate motion. Plates are pushed apart at spreading zones and pulled down into the crust at sub-duction zones. CPI: Explain the mechanisms for plate motions using earthquake data, mathematics, and conceptual models.
