Unit Overview/Summary:  

Summary  

The unit organizes performance expectations with a focus on helping students build understanding of traits of organisms. Instruction developed from this unit should always maintain the three-dimensional nature of the standards and recognize that instruction is not limited to the practices and concepts directly linked with any of the unit performance expectations.  

Connections between unit Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCIs)   

The idea that rainfall, water, ice, wind, and living organisms help to shape the land (ESS2.A as in 4-ESS2-1) connects to the idea waves, which are regular patterns of motion, can be made in water by disturbing the surface, and can cause objects to move (PS4.A as in 4-PS4-1).  

Another concept related to affecting the land is that living things affect the physical characteristics of their regions (ESS2.E as in 4-ESS2-1). And the relationship between living things and the land connects to the ideas that the presence and location of certain fossil types indicate the order in which rock layers were formed (ESS1.C as in 4-ESS1-1), and that rainfall affects the types of living things found in a region (ESS2.A as in 4-ESS2-1).  

The engineering design idea that testing a solution involves investigating how well it performs under a range of likely conditions (ETS1.B as in 3-5-ETS1-2) could be applied to multiple science concepts such as that water, ice, wind, living organisms, and gravity break rocks, soils, and sediments into smaller particles and move them around (ESS2.A as in 4-ESS2-1), and that waves can cause objects to move (PS4.A as in 4-PS4-1). Connections could be made through tasks such as by having students design a solution to reduce effects of erosion by wind, or by having students design a solution to ocean waves moving beach sand. Either kind of design should be tested within a range of likely conditions since rates of erosion can vary, as can the size of waves. 

Unit Science and Engineering Practices (SEPs) 

Instruction leading to this unit of PEs will help students build toward proficiency in elements of the practices of developing and using models (4-PS4-1), planning and carrying out investigations (4-ESS2-1), and constructing explanations and designing solutions (4-ESS1-1 and 3-5-ETS1-2). Many other practice elements can be used in instruction. 

Unit Crosscutting Concepts (CCCs)

Crosscutting concepts have value because they provide students with connections and intellectual tools that are related across the differing areas of disciplinary content and can enrich their application of practices and their understanding of core ideas. As such, they are a way of linking the different domains of science.

Instruction leading to this unit of PEs will help students build toward proficiency in elements of the crosscutting concepts of Patterns (4-PS4-1 and 4-ESS1-1) and Cause and Effect (4-ESS2-1). Many other crosscutting concepts elements can be used in instruction. All instruction should be three-dimensional.