This curriculum unit was developed from the Learning Through Performance in Middle School Math and Science Project. The goal of the project was to develop, pilot, and research the efficacy of a 6th grade math course and science course that are designed to align with 6th grade Common Core Mathematics Standards and Next Generation Science Standards. The curriculum was designed to exemplify the use of project-based learning as the primary instructional approach, and instructionally embedded performance-based assessments as the primary assessment strategy. The rationale for building project-based learning units was to support greater student engagement and deeper learning of rigorous content through authentic, real-world applications of math and science. The rationale for building performance-based assessments into each unit of study was to support more reliable and valid measurement of individual students’ learning and performance on relevant math and science concepts and practices.
All of the curriculum materials were designed to have teachers participate in professional development to help support them in the design approach as well as implementing the materials in their classroom. If you would like further information about professional development services, please contact us.
Unit Overview
This summary is based on information found in the NGSS Framework.
Disciplinary Core Idea ESS3: Earth and Human Activity
This unit falls within the Disciplinary Core Idea ESS3: Earth and Human Activity.
In the Climate Change unit, students focus on two aspects from ESS3.C, Human Impacts on Earth Systems, and ESS3.D, Global Climate Change, by formulating answers to the questions “How do we know our global climate is changing?” and “How do human activities affect Earth systems?” (In the NRC Framework, the concept of climate change can also be broken down into two sub-ideas: global climate change and human impact on Earth systems.) In the context of this Disciplinary Core Idea, students will achieve the following goals by the end of this unit:
- Ask questions to clarify evidence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century.
- Gain knowledge of the causes and effects of climate change and use that knowledge to develop methods to monitor and minimize human impact on greenhouse gas production.
Note that the crosscutting concept of cause and effect is of paramount importance in this unit.
In this sixth grade Climate Change unit, students ask questions about climate change that will guide their explorations throughout the unit. In line with these questions, they will investigate how greenhouse gases in the atmosphere affect global temperature, which they will combine with other analyzed evidence to construct an explanation for the causes of climate change. Through research, they will identify the impacts of climate change on humans and the environment, creating an imperative for action. By the end of this unit, they will be able to develop their own informed action plans to reduce greenhouse gas production in their own classroom. Moving into sixth grade curriculum, it is important to know that while students may have heard of climate change in popular media, they will not yet have defined much of the basic vocabulary associated with the topic, such as climate, global warming, greenhouse gases, mitigation, etc. Students may have a basic understanding that our climate is changing, but do not have knowledge of the cause and effect processes as well as evidence-based thinking in this context.
