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  • Kindergarten

    Earth's Systems

Students who demonstrate understanding can:

Performance Expectations

  1. Construct an argument supported by evidence for how plants and animals (including humans) can change the environment to meet their needs. K-ESS2-2

    Clarification Statement and Assessment Boundary

A Peformance Expectation (PE) is what a student should be able to do to show mastery of a concept. Some PEs include a Clarification Statement and/or an Assessment Boundary. These can be found by clicking the PE for "More Info." By hovering over a PE, its corresponding pieces from the Science and Engineering Practices, Disciplinary Core Ideas, and Crosscutting Concepts will be highlighted.

Science and Engineering Practices

Disciplinary Core Ideas

Crosscutting Concepts

By clicking on a specific Science and Engineering Practice, Disciplinary Core Idea, or Crosscutting Concept, you can find out more information on it. By hovering over one you can find its corresponding elements in the PEs.

Planning Curriculum

Common Core State Standards Connections

ELA/Literacy

  • RI.K.1 - With prompting and support, ask and answer questions about key details in a text. (K-ESS2-2)
  • W.K.1 - Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose opinion pieces in which they tell a reader the topic or the name of the book they are writing about and state an opinion or preference about the topic or book. (K-ESS2-2)
  • W.K.2 - Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they name what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic. (K-ESS2-2)

Model Course Mapping

First Time Visitors

Resources & Lesson Plans

  • More resources added each week!
    A team of teacher curators is working to find, review, and vet online resources that support the standards. Check back often, as NSTA continues to add more targeted resources.
  • PictureSTEM: Designing Hamster Habitats

    Students are introduced to a fictional problem (the need for a new hamster habitat in a pet store) and are invited to solve the problem through an engineering design (a hamster habitat). They work through a series of lessons to learn about the n ...

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  •  Checkerspot Challenge.pptx

  •  Corn Storyline

    This second-grade unit on plant growth starts off with students exploring the mystery of their harvest corn, something they initially saw as decoration, beginning to sprout what appears to be leaves and roots. Disagreements about how the corn is grow...

Planning Curriculum gives connections to other areas of study for easier curriculum creation.