Science · Unit 6 · Weeks 31–36
Environment, Fossils & Science Fair
The big idea
Your child grows bean plants in sunlight and in the dark to see how the environment can change traits like height and color. Then your child learns how fossils form and what they tell us about living things and environments long ago, and collects and graphs data on one trait in a group. The year ends with a science fair investigation, from testable question to presented conclusion, and a review of the whole year.
Standards in plain words
- 3-LS3-2 Uses evidence to explain that the environment can affect traits.
- 3-LS3-1 Uses data to show that plants and animals inherit traits from their parents and that traits vary within a group of similar living things.
- 3-LS4-1 Uses data from fossils to learn about living things and the environments they lived in long ago.
- 3-LS4-2 Uses evidence to explain how differences among individuals of the same kind can help some survive, find mates and have young.
- 3-5-ETS1-1 Defines a simple design problem, including what success looks like and limits on materials, time or cost.
- 3-5-ETS1-3 Plans and runs fair tests that change one thing at a time and look for weak points, to find ways to improve a model or prototype.
What mastery looks like
- Sets up a fair test of bean plants in different light and explains that a tall, pale sprout grown in the dark is the same kind of plant.
- Gives an example of the environment affecting an animal's traits, such as a fish in a crowded tank.
- Explains how most fossils form and uses fossils, such as sea shells in mountain rock, as evidence of past environments.
- Collects trait data with a tally chart, makes a bar graph that starts at 0, and describes the variation.
- Plans, runs and presents a fair test with three trials, a graph and a claim backed by evidence.
Materials
- Dry bean seeds, two clear cups and potting soil
- Ruler and graph paper
- Modeling clay and a shell or leaf for a fossil model
- Newspaper and white paper circles
- Index cards for sorting
- Poster board for the science fair
- Science notebook
Anchor texts
- Reading About Our World passages: 'Clues in the Rocks' (Week 33) and 'Nature and Surroundings' (Week 36)
- Video hub topics: the same species in different environments, what fossils are, collecting survey data, and planning materials, steps and a data table
Watch across the unit
Watch for: Saying the plant grown in the dark 'grew better' because it is taller, or that it became a different plant.
Try: Compare color, thickness and how well each stands up, and point to the matching leaf shape: same kind of plant, different environment.
Watch for: Thinking any old bone is a fossil, that fossils are only dinosaurs, or that fossils form in a few years.
Try: Show fern and shell fossils, and explain that a real fossil takes far longer than many lifetimes to form.
Watch for: Writing a conclusion that matches the prediction instead of the data.
Try: Cover the prediction and ask, 'What do the numbers say?' before writing the claim.
Pacing
Short week: Start the bean cups on the Week 31 Monday even in a short week, since they need days to grow. In the science fair week, protect the testing day and the presentation. For the trait survey, choose animals or plants, such as the fur color of dogs at a park or the leaf shapes of one kind of plant.
Flex week: Week 32 is the flex week. Practice sorting inherited and learned traits, or enrich with the newspaper camouflage model, measuring and graphing a group of beans, and designing a bird suited to a habitat. End with a review and reflection.
Week by week
| Week | Topic | Investigation |
|---|---|---|
| Week 31 | Environment affects traits | Grow plants in different conditions |
| Week 32 | Flex week | Choice investigation |
| Week 33 | Fossils & past environments | What fossils tell us |
| Week 34 | Trait survey | Collect and graph trait data |
| Week 35 | Science fair | Run and present an investigation |
| Week 36 | Year review | Unit 6 test and year-end assessment |