Science Competency Assurance Documents

Primary Grade Three: Physical Science

Standard 1: The student understands that objects and materials have observable properties that may be used to describe and classify them. They also observe and investigate phenomena such as heat, electricity, and sound and realize they are produced and transferred in various ways.

• Academic Expectation 2.1: Students understand scientific ways of thinking and working and use those methods to solve real-life problems.
• Academic Expectation 2.2: Students identify, analyze, and use patterns such as cycles and trends to understand past and present events and predict possible future events.
• Academic Expectation 2.3: Students identify and analyze systems and the ways their components work together or affect each other.

Core Content

Demonstrators

States of Matter

SC-E-1.1.3

Materials can exist in different states-solid, liquid, and gas. Heating or cooling can change some common materials, such as water, from one state to another.

SC-E-1.1.3

Distinguish a solution from non-solution.

Recognize evidence of dissolving.

Identify sub-systems of a liquid mixture through filtration or evaporation.

Compare properties of various liquids.

Observe and predict the changes that result when solutions evaporate.

Amount of Change Related to Strength of Push or Pull

SC-E-1.2.3

Pushing or pulling can change the position and motion of objects. The amount of the change in position and motion is related to the strength of the push or pull (force). The force with which a ball is hit illustrates this principle.

SC-E-1.2.3

Describe evidence of interactions or forces between objects.

Construct a lever to illustrate how levers can be used to overcome resistance.

Describe the bouncing pattern of a ball. Find out how the pattern changes when it collides with other objects/ forces.

Design an investigation involving variables that effect motion such as the quantity of mass, friction, or force exerted.

Sound as a Manifestation of Motion

SC-E-1.2.4

Vibration is a type of motion. Vibrating objects produces sound. Changing the rate of vibration can vary the pitch of the sound.

SC-E-1.2.4

Describe ways sounds change.

Explain how volume and pitch are different and how they can be changed.

Use a model that demonstrates that sound is made by vibrations.

Demonstrate the differences in vibrating patterns of different sounds; high frequency, low frequency; loud volume, soft volume.

Compare the transmission of sound through air, wood, and other materials.

Identify variables responsible for changes in pitch.

Design a musical instrument and explain how differences in form relate to differences in sound.

Heat

SC-E-1.3.2

Heat can be produced in many ways such as burning or rubbing. One way heat can move from one object to another is by conduction. Some materials absorb and conduct heat better than others. For example, metal objects conduct heat better than wooden objects.

SC-E-1.3.2

Place different boxes, each wrapped in a different color of paper, under a light source. Record the temperature inside each box.

Bend a paper clip rapidly back and forth. Feel the bent area using your fingers.

Test various materials by placing them under a heat source. Feel the temperature difference with your fingers or record the temperatures with a thermometer.

Electricity

SC-E-1.3.3

Electricity in circuits can produce light, heat, sound, and magnetic effects. Electrical circuits require a complete conducting path through which an electrical current can pass.

SC-E-1.3.3

Use a bulb, battery, and wire system to test objects for conductivity.

Observe the materials contained inside of a light bulb and diagram the flow of electricity that lights the bulb.

Use a motor, battery, and wire system to test objects for insulation capabilities.

Science Process Vocabulary: classify, collect data, communicate, identify variables, infer, measure, observe, organize data, predict

Science Content Vocabulary: circuit, closed circuit, conduction, cooling, current, energy, energy source, force, frequency, friction, heat, heating, insulation, insulator, interaction, lever, light, machine, matter, melting, motion, object, open circuit, pattern, pitch, pulley, rate, sound, temperature, vibration, volume

Primary Grade Three: Earth Science

Standard 2: The student understands that the earth materials are solid rocks, soils, water, and gases in the atmosphere (air) and that these materials have observable properties and characteristics that can be described and measured. Weather conditions on the Earth, and particularly in our area, change from day to day and weather patterns change over seasons. The sun and the moon, as well as their basic positions and motions, can be observed and described relative to the Earth.

• Academic Expectation 2.1: Students understand scientific ways of thinking and working and use those methods to solve real-life problems.
• Academic Expectation 2.2: Students identify, analyze, and use patterns such as cycles and trends to understand past and present events and predict possible future events.
• Academic Expectation 2.3: Students identify and analyze systems and the ways their components work together or affect each other.

Core Content

Demonstrators

Rocks, Water, Air as Materials

SC-E-2.1.1

Earth Materials are solid rocks and soils, water, and the gases of the atmosphere. Minerals that make up rocks have properties of color, texture, and hardness. Soils have properties of color, texture, the capacity to retain water, and the ability to support plant growth. Water on the Earth and in the atmosphere can be a solid, liquid, or gas.

SC-E-2.1.1

Observe and record the properties of several rocks.

Sort rocks by observed similarities and differences.

Group rocks based upon field tests that geologists use to identify rocks and minerals (streak test, hardness, acid test, shape, color, etc.).

Use of Earth’s Resources

SC-E-2.1.2

Earth materials provide many of the resources humans use. The varied materials have different physical and chemical properties, which make them useful in different ways, for example, as building materials (e.g., stone, clay marble), as fuel (e.g. petroleum, natural gas), or growing the plants we use as food

SC-E-2.1.2

Identify the many uses of sand.

Using a soil test kit (purchased at a garden supply store), test soil for different minerals.

Classify fossil fuels as solid, liquid, and gas. Find out how these were/are used in the school community in the past and present.

Fossils and Environment

SC-E- 2.1.3

Fossils found in Earth materials provide evidence about organisms that lived long ago and the nature of the environment at that time.

SC-E-2.1.3

Collect and observe fossils from your local environment.

Use rubbings of leaves as compared to fossils of plants found in rocks.

Weather

SC-E-2.3.2

Weather changes from day to day and from over seasons. Weather can be described by observations and measurable qualities such as temperature, wind direction and speed, and precipitation.

SC-E-2.3.2

Place an ice cube in a covered plastic container to observe melting, evaporation, and condensation.

Discuss and record observable weather characteristics for two weeks.

Compare inside and outside temperatures.

Record the temperature changes of hot and cold water.

Make and use a rain gauge.

Record precipitation amounts daily.

Observe, record, and classify cloud patterns.

Observe, record, and graph wind direction and speed.

Earth, Moon, Sun Movements

SC-E-2.3.3

Changes in movement of objects in the sky have patterns that can be observed and described. The Sun appears to move across the sky in the same way very day, but the Sun’s apparent path changes slowly over seasons. The moon moves across the sky on a daily basis much like the Sun. The observable shape of the moon changes from day to day in a cycle that lasts about one month.

SC-E-2.3.3

Observe changes in shadows throughout the day.

Observe and record the phases of the moon.

Science Process Vocabulary: classify, collect data, communicate, identify variables, infer, measure, observe, organize data, predict

Science Content Vocabulary: acid test, building material, cirrus, cloud, color, condensation, crystal, cumulus, cycle, day, earth, earth material, environment, evaporation, evidence, fall, fossil, fossil fuel, gas, geology, hardness, luster, melt, meteorology, mineral, month, moon, precipitation, rain, rain gauge, resource, rock, seasons, shadow, shape, sky, snow, soil, solid, spring, stratus, streak test, summer, sun, temperature, thermometer, water, water cycle, weather, wind direction, wind speed, winter

Primary Grade Three: Life Science

Standard 3: The student understands that there are living and once-living organisms and non-living objects on the Earth. Living things, or organisms, have needs, structures, and behaviors and differences that can be observed and described. Organisms grow and develop in a life cycle pattern. They affect and respond to the environment in which they live.

• Academic Expectation 2.1: Students understand scientific ways of thinking and working and use those methods to solve real-life problems.
• Academic Expectation 2.2: Students identify, analyze, and use patterns such as cycles and trends to understand past and present events and predict possible future events.
• Academic Expectation 2.3: Students identify and analyze systems and the ways their components work together or affect each other.

Core Content

Demonstrators

Classifying Living Things

SC-E-3.1.1

Things in the environment are classified as living, nonliving, and once living. Living things differ from nonliving things. Organisms are classified into groups by using various characteristics (e.g. body coverings, body structures).

SC-E-3.1.1

Classify organisms based upon physical similarities.

Classify vertebrates in five major categories (mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, amphibians) using body coverings as one property.

Structures and Functions

SC-E-3.1.3

Each plant or animal has different structures that serve different functions in growth, survival, and reproduction. For example, humans have distinct body structures for walking, holding, seeing, and talking.

SC-E-3.1.3

Use two-category Venn diagrams to group animals by categories such as behaviors (i.e. hop, fly or egg layers), structures (beaks, or wings0 and/or habitats (fresh water, land).

Observe and compare seeds properties of various fruits. Group by properties such as seed structure or number.

Compare the structures of various germinating seeds.

Observe, compare, and record the structures and behavior of different invertebrates (e.g., crayfish to cricket) and vertebrates (e.g., amphibians to reptiles).

Describe different ways humans can move and name the body structures used to execute the movements.

Name the sense organs of the human body and describe their functions.

Relationships Among Produces, Consumers, and Decomposers

SC-E-3.3.1

Plants make their own food. All animals depend on plants. Some animals eat plants for food. Other animals eat animals that eat the plants.

SC-E-3.3.1

Observe animal behaviors and interactions using the terms, predator and prey.

Classify animals by feeding relationships (i.e. first and second order consumers). Design and conduct investigations to determine feeding relationships.

Diagram feeding interactions among populations of plants and animals to show a food chain and/or food web.

Effect of Environmental Changes on Organisms

SC-E-3.3.2

The world has many different environments. Distinct environments support the life of different types of organisms. When the environment changes, some plants and animals survive and reproduce, and others die or move to new locations.

SC-E-3.3.2

Identify a variety of habitats and the plants or animals associated with them.

Predict the effect on the population of an organism if the death rate of its food source (plant or animal) is increasing.

Investigate factors that influence biotic potential.

Observe plant and animal characteristics and make inferences about how these organisms are adapted to their habitats.

Relationships Between Organisms and the Environment

SC-E-3.3.3

All organisms, including humans, cause changes in the environment where they live. Some of these changes are detrimental to the organism or to other organisms; other changes are beneficial (e.g. dams built by beavers benefit some aquatic organisms but are detrimental to others).

Investigate the effect that an over-population has on the environment.

Predict the effect that a population explosion has on the offspring of an organism.

Science Process Vocabulary: classify, collect data, communicate, identify variables, infer, measure, observe, organize data, predict

Science Content Vocabulary: adaptation, amphibian, animal, biotic potential, bird, carnivore, fish, food chain, food web, function, germination, habitat, herbivore, interaction, invertebrate, life cycle, living, mammal, nonliving, offspring, omnivore, once living, organism, over population, plant, population, population decrease, population increase, predator, prey, reptile, seed, senses (hear, see, smell, taste, touch), structure, vertebrate