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PHYSICAL SCIENCE

Pre-K to 5th Grade

Properties of objects and materials
Position and motion of objects
Light, heat, electricity, & magnetism

Pre-K	physical science: properties of objects & materials
understandings: Properties of materials can be observed, measured and predicted. Objects have many observable properties, including size, weight, shape, color, temperature, and the ability to react with other substances.
essential questions: How are objects described? How can we describe and classify the things around us? How has the material changed during the investigation?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Describe materials based on common properties.	Objects can be described in terms of the materials they are made of (clay, cloth, paper, etc.) and their physical properties (color, size, shape, weight, hot or cold, texture, flexibility, attraction to magnets, floating and sinking, etc.).	AIMS: Project AIMS “Sherlock Combs The Yard” “How Are These Alike?” “Don’t Leaf Out The Vegetables” In a small group, describe a variety of items such as beads, bears, cotton balls, and craft sticks. With adult direction, sort items based on texture, color, hardness, size, weight, shape, and temperature.
Observe changes that occur in materials and substances.	Experiences hot and cold as opposites. Dissolving, ice melting. In a small group, make play dough. Observe changes that occur as ingredients are mixed and heated.	Students mix blue and yellow finger paint together and describe the change that occurs. After exploring with the combination of various primary colors to create secondary colors, students are asked to describe how they made each color. Students are asked to describe and/or demonstrate how to create orange, purple, and green using the primary colors.

Pre-K	physical science: light, heat, electricity, and magnetism
understandings: Magnets attract and repel each other and certain kinds of other materials.
essential questions: How do magnets act with different materials?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Observe that magnets can push or pull some objects and not other objects.	Magnets, Predict, Magnetic, Non-Magnetic.	Students explore a variety of magnets and materials in a science center. Predict and test which common objects will be attracted to magnets. Classify objects as being attracted or not attracted to magnets. Identify items in the home that contain a magnet or magnets (Example: refrigerator magnets).

Kindergarten	physical science: properties of objects & materials
understandings: Objects have many observable properties, including size, shape, color. Those properties can be described and communicated to others. Objects are made of one or more materials, such as paper, wood, and metal. Objects can be described by the properties of the materials from which they are made.
essential questions: How can we describe and classify the things around us? How does water change? What steps does it take to change a liquid to a solid? What materials are in mixtures?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Describe and classify physical properties of materials.	Objects can be described in terms of the materials they are made of (clay, cloth, paper, etc.) and their physical properties (color, size, shape, weight, hot or cold, texture, flexibility, attraction to magnets, floating and sinking, etc.). In a small group, describe a variety of items such as beads, bears, cotton balls, and craft sticks. With adult direction, sort items based on texture, color, hardness, size, weight, shape, and temperature. Classify buttons based on different attributes.	AIMS: Math & Sci: Solution I “It’s A Shoe In!” AIMS: Under Construction “All Sorts of Stuff” “Bag it” “Sizing Up Bears” AIMS: Sense-able Science “Texture Rough, Texture Smooth” “Touch and Tell” “Color My World” AIMS: Primarily Bears “Let Me Count the Ways” “Bears Afloat” AIMS: Mostly Magnets “Stick to It” “What Will a Magnet Attract?” “Mining With Magnets” AIMS: Spring Into Math & Sci “Floating Fruits” “What Do You Think Will Float?”
Describe mixtures that are made up of more than one material.	Identify the ingredients used to make a new substance (pudding, paper maché, etc.). Describe the properties before and after.	Make Jell-O and/or various soups and drinks from powders that dissolve in water. Experiment with mixing various materials with water. Classify materials into those that dissolve in water and those that do not. Students are asked to carry out a teacher-designed investigation to explore whether certain materials e.g., salt, coffee grounds, pencil shavings) dissolve in water. They record data by gluing a picture of each of the substances onto the appropriate column of a Dissolve/Not Dissolve” chart. Results are shared in a small group setting.
Show how water can be a liquid or a solid and can be made to change back and forth.	Solid, Liquid, Gas.	Freeze water, allow it to melt, and refreeze it. Can record the time it takes to freeze and melt.
Explain how water left in an open container evaporates (goes into the air), but water in a closed container does not	Evaporation.	Have two containers side-by-side. Use stacked coins next to the container to measure the height of the water, taking them away each day as the water evaporates. Record the data each day and compare at the end of the week.

Kindergarten	physical science: position and motion of objects
understandings: The position of an object can be described by locating it relative to another object or the background. The position and motion of objects can be changed by pushing or pulling. The size of the change is related to the strength of the push or pull.
essential questions: How can we describe the position of objects around us? How can you change the motion of an object with a push or pull? What effect do different surfaces have on a moving object? How do different objects move? What will happen when we objects from a certain height?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Demonstrate how to change the motion of an object by giving it a push or a pull.	Demonstrate ways the motion of a ball will be changed from the pull provided by gravity rolling down a ramp of various heights.	Design, plan, and construct ramps with simple tools and a variety of materials. Later discuss what materials and designs worked best.
Demonstrate that objects move differently on different surfaces.	Investigate how a ball rolls on different surfaces (rug, tile, grass, etc.).	Students set up a ramp with a certain number of books under it. They roll the same ball down the ramp while on grass, rug, tiles, concrete. Students can walk toe-to-heel to measure the distance the ball rolled. This number can be recorded in a data table. Extend the activity above with a game: Given different distances, students will manipulate the height, and texture of an inclined plane, as well as, the type of balls used so that when a ball is rolled down the ramp it will land on one of three specified targets. Share findings with others and discuss which conditions needed to be manipulated.

Demonstrate the different ways that objects move.	Straight, Round and Round, Fast, Slow, etc.	Experiment with balls and ramps by changing the variable (type of ball, height of ramp, pushing, rolling, dropping). Describe the movement of these balls compared to the movement of other balls. Describe the different ways a ball can move.
Demonstrate that things fall to the ground unless something holds them up.	All objects fall towards the ground. Hold objects up with arms stretched out. Gravity is pulling the object and the arms down and this is why they feel tired after a few minutes.	Hold a variety of objects and then release. Predict what will happen with each object. Make observations and tell what happens.

1^ST GRADE	physical science: properties of objects & materials
understandings: Objects have many observable properties, including size, weight, shape, color, temperature, and the ability to react with other substances. Those properties can be measured using tools, such as rulers, balances, and thermometers. Objects are made of one or more materials, such as paper, wood, and metal. Objects can be described by the properties of the materials from which they are made, and those properties can be used to separate or sort a group of objects or materials. Materials can exist in different states--solid, liquid, and gas. Some common materials, such as water, can be changed from one state to another by heating or cooling.
essential questions: How does water exist in different forms (states)? What are the observable properties of different objects? How can we change the properties of objects? How would you illustrate the water cycle? How would you prepare and separate mixtures into their parts?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Compare and contrast solids, liquids, and gasses.	Water can exist in all three states.	Students try to identify materials as solids, liquids, gasses in a series of investigations where they are not allowed to touch, hear, see, taste (not all at the same time) the objects or the containers they may be in. Students describe what characteristics led them to believe the object was a solid, liquid, or gas. AIMS: Off The Wall Science “The Inverted Tumbler”
Explains that different objects are made up of many different types of materials and have many different observable properties.	Select an object, using your senses to describe it and have another student identify it based on your description - color, size, shape, weight, texture (rough, smooth) flexibility (rigid, stiff, firm, flexible, strong), hardness, smell (pleasant, unpleasant).	AIMS: Math & Sci: A Solution “Sorting all Sorts” AIMS: Math & Sci: Solution I “On Your Own Two Feet” (ignore exercise requiring percents - just graph) AIMS: Project AIMS “What Do You Think Will Float” “Egg In Water” “Orange In Water” “Let Me Count The Ways” (weight - just use a cup hanging from a rubber band to see which hangs down lower. See AIMS “Rubber Band Stretch”)
Observes and describes that things can be done to materials to change some of their properties.	Describe the physical properties and changes of a substance when dissolved in a liquid. - bending, cutting, heating, cooling, rusting, dissolving, breaking, crumbling, making clay models, carving wood, melting wax or steel.	AIMS: Project AIMS “Homemade Ice Cream” “Spinning Ghosts”
Illustrates that water exists in the air as a liquid, solid, or gas and can change from one form to another.	States of matter—solid, liquid, gas. - changes in state of water or other substances: freezing, melting, puddles drying up.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “Melt A Cube” “Keep A Cube” AIMS: Water Precious Water “Grapes To Raisins” “Water, Precious Water - Mini Water Cycle”
Prepares mixtures and separates them into their component parts.	Mixture, solution. Separation techniques: filtration, using filters sieves, funnels, beakers, magnets, floating vs. sinking. Mixtures of various kinds: salt and pepper, iron filings and sand, sand and sugar, rocks and wood chips, sand and gravel, sugar or salt solutions.	AIMS: Water Precious Water Pgs. 27-29

1^ST GRADE	physical science: position and motion of objects
understandings: Sound is produced by vibrating objects. The pitch of the sound can be varied by changing the rate of vibration.
essential questions: How is sound made? What effect does tension have on high and low pitch?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Observe that vibrating objects produce sound (wave interactions).	Students place their hands on their neck and make different sounds. Make observations.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “Sound Is Vibration” “Paper Cup Telephone” “Big Ears”

1^ST GRADE	physical science: light, heat, electricity, and magnetism
understandings: Light travels in a straight line until it strikes an object. Heat can be produced in many ways, such as burning, rubbing, or mixing one substance with another. Heat can move from one object to another. Electricity in circuits can produce light, heat, sound, and magnetic effects.
essential questions: How does light move? What are examples of light sources? How is heat produced? What objects affect white light? How do different objects (mirrors/prisms) affect white light? How do objects change when magnified?
benchmarks	clarifying examples and/or vocabulary	best practices and/or lesson ideas	notes
Observe that the Sun supplies heat and light to Earth.	Give examples that the Sun warms the land, air, and water.	AIMS: Sense-able Science “I See The Light” Place your hands on a concrete ball or tree trunk throughout the day. Describe the temperature (hot, warm, cool, etc.). Were there changes in temperature over time? Explain what caused the changes. What if you feel the part that is farthest from the sun and/or closest to the sun?
Identify sources of light, and observe that objects and their characteristics cannot be seen without a light source.	Give examples (sun, heat due to friction or in electrical circuits, such as a light bulb).	AIMS: Primarily Physics “Light Sources” Play a game where students guess what is inside a dark box by only using senses other than sight.
Discover that heat can be produced in many ways.	Burning, rubbing, mixing substances together.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “What Is Hot, What is Cold” “Hot Or Cold” “What Is The Temperature” “Heat Energy From Friction” Student investigate that dark cars radiate more heat than light cars and that temperatures inside a closed car can rise to unsafe levels on hot days.
Identify things that produce colors from white light.	Access and process information from readings, observations, and experiences using prisms, soap bubbles, oil films to disperse light into its component colors. Compare to bubbles and oil films.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “I Love Color” “Prism Power” AIMS: Project AIMS “Mixing Light’s Colors” “Reach For A Rainbow” “Make A Rainbow”
Explain that light travels in a straight line until it strikes an object.	Explain how shadows are made. Shadow, blocked path, surface, object, light moves outward from source in straight lines. Shadows made on surfaces by putting objects in the path of light from common sources, including sunlight, light bulbs, projectors. Changes in size of shadows due to distance from object.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “Mirrors Reflect” “Magnify” AIMS: Pieces & Patterns “Mirror, Mirror” “Halves & Halve-Nots” “Mirrors That Multiply” “Me & My Shadow”
Use technology to enlarge objects and makes observations.	Look at various objects using hand lenses, stereoscopes, and microscopes. Make diagrams of these observations.	AIMS: Primarily Physics “Magnify”

2^nd GRADE

physical science:</