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The Learning Pit
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Please click on the links below for curricula.
Science Syllabus 2019
IMS Syllabus 2019
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Help your child feel confident and perform well in middle school.
Click on the image below to read the article: “7 steps to succeeding in middle school”
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NGSS Life Science Standards – Grade 6
- The collection of fossils and their placement in chronological order (e.g. through the location of the sedimentary layers in which they are found or through radioactive dating) is known as the fossil record. It documents the existence, diversity, extinction, and change of many life forms throughout the history of life on Earth. (MS-LS4-1)
- Anatomical similarities and differences between various organisms living today and between them and organisms in the fossil record, enable the reconstruction of evolutionary history and the inference of lines of evolutionary descent. (MS-LS4-2)
- Comparison of the embryological development of different species also reveals similarities that show relationships not evident in the fully-formed anatomy. (MS-LS4-3)
- Adaptation by natural selection acting over generations is one important process by which species change over time in response to changes in environmental conditions. Traits that support successful survival and reproduction in the new environment become more common; those that do not become less common. Thus, the distribution of traits in a population changes. (MS-LS4-6)
- Natural selection leads to the predominance of certain traits in a population, and the suppression of others. (MS-LS4-4)
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NGSS Earth/Space Science Standards – Grade 6
- The geologic time scale interpreted from rock strata provides a way to organize Earth’s history. Analyses of rock strata and the fossil record provide only relative dates, not an absolute scale. (MS-ESS1-4)
- Develop a model to describe the cycling of Earth’s materials and the flow of energy that drives this process. (MS-ESS2-1)
- Construct an explanation based on evidence for how geoscience processes have changed Earth’s surface at varying time and spatial scales. (MS-ESS2-2)
- Maps of ancient land and water patterns, based on investigations of rocks and fossils, make clear how Earth’s plates have moved great distances, collided, and spread apart. (MS-ESS2-3)
- Tectonic processes continually generate new ocean sea floor at ridges and destroy old sea floor at trenches. (MS-ESS2-3)
- Earth and its solar system are part of the Milky Way galaxy, which is one of many galaxies in the universe.
- The solar system consists of the sun and a collection of objects, including planets, their moons, and asteroids that are held in orbit around the sun by its gravitational pull on them. (MS-ESS1-2),(MS-ESS1-3)
- This model of the solar system can explain eclipses of the sun and the moon. Earth’s spin axis is fixed in direction over the short-term but tilted relative to its orbit around the sun. The seasons are a result of that tilt and are caused by the differential intensity of sunlight on different areas of Earth across the year. (MS-ESS1-1)
- The solar system appears to have formed from a disk of dust and gas, drawn together by gravity.
- Patterns of the apparent motion of the sun, the moon, and stars in the sky can be observed, described, predicted, and explained with models.
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NGSS Physical Science Standards – Grade 6
- A simple wave has a repeating pattern with a specific wavelength, frequency, and amplitude. (MS-PS4-1)
- A sound wave needs a medium through which it is transmitted. (MS-PS4-2)
- When light shines on an object, it is reflected, absorbed, or transmitted through the object, depending on the object’s material and the frequency (color) of the light. (MS-PS4-2)
- The path that light travels can be traced as straight lines, except at surfaces between different transparent materials (e.g., air and water, air and glass) where the light path bends. (MS-PS4-2)
- A wave model of light is useful for explaining brightness, color, and the frequency-dependent bending of light at a surface between media. (MS-PS4-2)
- However, because light can travel through space, it cannot be a matter wave, like sound or water waves. (MS-PS4-2)
- Digitized signals (sent as wave pulses) are a more reliable way to encode and transmit information. (MS-PS4-3)
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NGSS Engineering Design Science Standards – Grade 6
- Define a problem by precisely specifying criteria and constraints for solutions as well as potential impacts on society and the natural environment, systematically evaluating alternative solutions, analyzing data from tests of different solutions and combining the best ideas into an improved solution, and developing a model and iteratively testing and improving it to reach an optimal solution.
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