Stage B - Science

Descriptors

11A - Students who meet the standard know and apply the concepts, principles, and processes of scientific inquiry.

1. Describe observed science event, sequencing processes or steps, choosing/proposing causes or effects based on observations, or using measurable and descriptive attributes and units.
2. Begin guided inquiry investigations about objects, events, and/or organisms that can be tested, asking pertinent questions, predicting conditions that can influence change, or determining simple steps to follow to investigate selected question(s).
3. Conduct guided inquiry assembling proper materials and equipment, or following appropriate procedural steps and safety precautions.
4. Collect data for investigations, choosing and using appropriate instruments and units, recording data on classroom charts, tables, journals or on computers, or sorting or modifying pictures or drawings that illustrate data.
5. Analyze results investigation, organizing data on graphs or charts, constructing reasonable and accurate explanations from data, or applying qualitative and quantitative terminology that describes observed data patterns.
6. Communicate results of individual and group investigation, matching similar data from other data sources, identifying reasons for differences or discrepancies in the data, selecting data that can be used to predict future events or data trends, or generating questions for possible future inquiry investigations.

11B - Students who meet the standard know and apply the concepts, principles, and processes of technological design.

1. Propose ideas for solutions to technological design problem, asking questions about causes and effects of concept to model or test (e.g., how to test 'if-then' effects of magnets, batteries, sound, buoyancy), identifying criteria for measuring success of design, or prioritizing possible solutions from given list.
2. Begin a design solution, choosing procedural steps for construction and testing from teacher-generated options, suggesting the variables for testing criteria factors, or sketching the projected final design.
3. Construct the selected technological design using the materials and tools provided, recording anecdotal data from design process, or evaluating construction success.
4. Test for design success based on teacher-or student-generated criteria conducting multiple trials, or collecting data from tests using appropriate measurement methods.
5. Communicate results of design tests presenting group results which include data from student trials to evaluate design success in testing scientific principle, procedures followed, suggestions for second round of design, or evaluating best design to solve technological problem.

12A - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that explain how living things function, adapt, and change.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to explore common and diverse structures and functions of living things, describing how plants and animals obtain energy, categorizing animals by structures for food-getting and movement, comparing how plants and animals live and reproduce, associating common plant products with plant structures and functions, or comparing common and distinctive plants' or animals' growth cycles, structures and functions.

12B - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that describe how living things interact with each other and with their environment.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to explore the impact of plants and animals in their changing environments, identifying factors that affect animal and plant growth and reproduction, or matching plant and animal adaptations to changing seasons or climatic changes.
2. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to examine how plants and animals (including humans) survive together in their ecosystems describing the food chains or webs in various ecosystems, identifying local habitats, or identifying predator/prey and parasite/host relationships.

12C - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that describe properties of matter and energy and the interactions between them.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to demonstrate energy sources constructing and testing simple electrical circuits with batteries, demonstrating how sound is produced by vibrating objects, or analyzing which energy sources power different objects.
2. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to compare qualitative and quantitative properties of matter, identifying component materials in objects, classifying objects or materials according to variable masses, volumes, temperatures, and states, or constants such as texture, odor, magnetism and buoyancy.

12D - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that describe force and motion and the principles that explain them.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to compare and contrast common forces around us dramatizing the ways that forces cause action and reaction behaviors of common objects, distinguishing the work of simple machines, describing the attraction and repulsion of magnetic and electrical fields, or sorting examples of natural or man-made forces.
2. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to make connections between the basic concepts of motion to real world applications describing how gravity affects motion, demonstrating the rate, time and distance factors and units for speed, or describing examples of inertia and momentum in the classroom, playground and at home.

12E - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that describe the features and processes of Earth and its resources.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to demonstrate the properties of Earth's basic materials describing different types and uses of Earth's rocks, soils and minerals, identifying major sources/locations of water on the planet, or identifying major Earth and atmospheric features from photographs including those from satellites.
2. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to examine the natural processes that change Earth's surface modeling erosion processes in various soil compositions, or comparing different water flow models for weathering impact, or identifying water cycle in local weather conditions and features.
3. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to examine various renewable or non-renewable resources comparing different paper, glass or plastic composition examples, collecting data about paper, glass or plastic consumption at school over time, or predicting futuristic resource uses and availabilities.

12F - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that explain the composition and structure of the universe and Earth's place in it.

1. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to describe the main bodies in the solar system identifying the sizes, distances, and relationships of them, relating Earth's dependence on the Sun for heat and light, modeling the phases of the Moon, or suggesting how and why people have studied and explained the solar system through time.
2. Apply scientific inquiries or technological designs to explain the seasonal and annual motions of the Earth and other planets in relation to the Sun, modeling the Earth's motion in relation to the Sun during the day, night, year, introducing the comparative orbits of planets in the solar system, relating the moon's orbit to its observed phases, or using constellation models to explain apparent changes in the night sky.

13A - Students who meet the standard know and apply accepted practices of science.

1. Apply the appropriate principles of safety explaining the dangers of electricity to applicable classroom and home situations, refraining from tasting unknown substances, mapping pathways to leave classroom or home in case of fire or severe weather situations, or identifying safety hazards associated with classroom science inquiry or design investigations.
2. Apply scientific habits of mind proposing ways to test student-generated predictions for science-conceptual relationships, practicing how scientists generate questions for possible studies, relating knowledge that was gained through careful, repeated observations by classmates, or distinguishing hypotheses from guesses.

13B - Students who meet the standard know and apply concepts that describe the interaction between science, technology, and society.

1. Apply the use of appropriate scientific technologies in inquiry and design investigations selecting appropriate technologies for measuring and recording data, comparing accuracy of estimations and precise measurements, sequencing appropriate steps for instructed use of equipment, or investigating the technology of measuring time in history
2. Correlate careers and avocations in life, environmental, physical, earth and space sciences to important historical events and ordinary daily life studying applicable personal interest stories, or reporting on specific examples of how scientists or technologists have affected society.
3. Describe the science connections to the fields of transportation, medicine, agriculture, sanitation, communication associating these fields to pertinent life, environmental, physical, earth and space science concepts, describing ways sciences and technology have affected societal problems in the past, present and projected future, identifying types and causes of pollutions, or applying the practices of reducing, reusing, or recycling renewable resources.

back to Science Classroom Assessments and Performance Descriptors