Big Idea 1: The Practice of Science

SC.7.N.1.1 Define a problem from the seventh grade curriculum, use appropriate reference materials to support scientific understanding, plan and carry out scientific investigation of various types, such as systematic observations or experiments, identify variables, collect and organize data, interpret data in charts, tables, and graphics, analyze information, make predictions, and defend conclusions.

Video: Bottle Tones, part 1
Video: Bottle Tones, part 2
Video: Candles in a Jar, part 1
Video: Candles in a Jar, part 2
Video: Science Fair Panic, part 1
Video: Science Fair Panic, part 2
Video: Science Fair Panic, part 3
Video: Science Fair Panic, part 4
Video: Strange Flame, part 1
Video: Strange Flame, part 2
Video: Floating Cups

SC.7.N.1.2 Differentiate replication (by others) from repetition (multiple trials).

Video: Science Fair Panic, part 2
Video: Science Fair Panic, part 3
Video: Floating Cups

SC.7.N.1.3 Distinguish between an experiment (which must involve the identification and control of variables) and other forms of scientific investigation and explain that not all scientific knowledge is derived from experimentation.

Video: Science Fair Panic, part 3
Video: Floating Cups

SC.7.N.1.4 Identify test variables (independent variables) and outcome variables (dependent variables) in an experiment.

Experiment: Ice Cream Foam

SC.7.N.1.5 Describe the methods used in the pursuit of a scientific explanation as seen in different fields of science such as biology, geology, and physics.

Video: Floating Cups

SC.7.N.1.6 Explain that empirical evidence is the cumulative body of observations of a natural phenomenon on which scientific explanations are based.

Video: Observation

SC.7.N.1.7 Explain that scientific knowledge is the result of a great deal of debate and confirmation within the science community.

Video: Floating Cups

Big Idea 2: The Characteristics of Scientific Knowledge

SC.7.N.2.1 Identify an instance from the history of science in which scientific knowledge has changed when new evidence or new interpretations are encountered.

Video: Science Fair Panic, part 2
Experiment: Is Gravity a Theory or a Law?

Big Idea 3: The Role of Theories, Laws, Hypotheses, and Models

SC.7.N.3.1 Recognize and explain the difference between theories and laws and give several examples of scientific theories and the evidence that supports them.

Experiment: Is Gravity a Theory or a Law?

SC.7.N.3.2 Identify the benefits and limitations of the use of scientific models.

Big Idea 6: Earth Structures

SC.7.E.6.1 Describe the layers of the solid Earth, including the lithosphere, the hot convecting mantle, and the dense metallic liquid and solid cores.

SC.7.E.6.2 Identify the patterns within the rock cycle and relate them to surface events (weathering and erosion) and sub-surface events (plate tectonics and mountain building).

Video: Rocks
Video: Erosion
Video: Continuous Change
Video: Fast and Slow Change

SC.7.E.6.3 Identify current methods for measuring the age of Earth and its parts, including the law of superposition and radioactive dating.

SC.7.E.6.4 Explain and give examples of how physical evidence supports scientific theories that Earth has evolved over geologic time due to natural processes.

Video: Fast and Slow Change
Video: Rocks

SC.7.E.6.5 Explore the scientific theory of plate tectonics by describing how the movement of Earth's crustal plates causes both slow and rapid changes in Earth's surface, including volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and mountain building.

Video: 75% Water
Video: Fast and Slow Change


SC.7.E.6.6 Identify the impact that humans have had on Earth, such as deforestation, urbanization, desertification, erosion, air and water quality, changing the flow of water.

Video: Erosion

SC.7.E.6.7 Recognize that heat flow and movement of material within Earth causes earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, and creates mountains and ocean basins.

Big Idea 10: Forms of Energy

SC.7.P.10.1 Illustrate that the sun's energy arrives as radiation with a wide range of wavelengths, including infrared, visible, and ultraviolet, and that white light is made up of a spectrum of many different colors.

Video: Looking for Rainbows
Video: A Color You Can't See

SC.7.P.10.2 Observe and explain that light can be reflected, refracted, and/or absorbed.

Video: White Foam
Video: Solar Power
Video: Mirage

SC.7.P.10.3 Recognize that light waves, sound waves, and other waves move at different speeds in different materials.

Video: Microwave Chocolate
Video: Light Speed Chocolate
Video: Changing the Speed of Light
Experiment: Dark Lines
Video: Mirage

Big Idea 11: Energy Transfer and Transformations

SC.7.P.11.1 Recognize that adding heat to or removing heat from a system may result in a temperature change and possibly a change of state.

Video: Ice Cream Science
Video: Ice and String
Video: Why We Sweat
Video: Watched Pot
Video: Water Cycle
Video: Crushed Can
Video: Dry Ice
Experiment: Quick, Easy Crystals

SC.7.P.11.2 Investigate and describe the transformation of energy from one form to another.

Video: High Bounce
Video: Solar Power
Video: Taking a Marshmallow Apart
Video: Simple Circuit

SC.7.P.11.3 Cite evidence to explain that energy cannot be created nor destroyed, only changed from one form to another.

SC.7.P.11.4 Observe and describe that heat flows in predictable ways, moving from warmer objects to cooler ones until they reach the same temperature.

Big Idea 15: Diversity and Evolution of Living Organisms

SC.7.L.15.1 Recognize that fossil evidence is consistent with the scientific theory of evolution that living things evolved from earlier species.

SC.7.L.15.2 Explore the scientific theory of evolution by recognizing and explaining ways in which genetic variation and environmental factors contribute to evolution by natural selection and diversity of organisms.

Experiment: Ear Genes

SC.7.L.15.3 Explore the scientific theory of evolution by relating how the inability of a species to adapt within a changing environment may contribute to the extinction of that species.

Big Idea 16: Heredity and Reproduction

SC.7.L.16.1 Understand and explain that every organism requires a set of instructions that specifies its traits, that this hereditary information (DNA) contains genes located in the chromosomes of each cell, and that heredity is the passage of these instructions from one generation to another.

Experiment: Ear Genes

SC.7.L.16.2 Determine the probabilities for genotype and phenotype combinations using Punnett Squares and pedigrees.

Experiment: Ear Genes

SC.7.L.16.3 Compare and contrast the general processes of sexual reproduction requiring meiosis and asexual reproduction requiring mitosis.

SC.7.L.16.4 Recognize and explore the impact of biotechnology (cloning, genetic engineering, artificial selection) on the individual, society and the environment.

Big Idea 17: Interdependence

SC.7.L.17.1 Explain and illustrate the roles of and relationships among producers, consumers, and decomposers in the process of energy transfer in a food web.

SC.7.L.17.2 Compare and contrast the relationships among organisms such as mutualism, predation, parasitism, competition, and commensalism.

SC.7.L.17.3 Describe and investigate various limiting factors in the local ecosystem and their impact on native populations, including food, shelter, water, space, disease, parasitism, predation, and nesting sites.