Summary of Skills

Unit 1: Weather and Climate

Science

Science

• Ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century.
• Catastrophic events of weather systems such as hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes can shape and restructure the environment through the force and motion evident in them.
• Collect data to provide evidence for how the motions and complex interactions of air masses result in changes in weather conditions.
• Compare the composition, properties and structure of Earth's atmosphere to include: mixtures of gases and differences in temperature and pressure within layers.
• Conclude that the good health of humans requires monitoring the atmosphere, maintaining air quality and stewardship.
• Describe how energy from the Sun, hydrosphere, and atmosphere interact and influence weather and climate.
• Describe the interactions between ocean currents.
• Explain how the cycling of water in and out of the atmosphere and atmospheric conditions relate to the weather patterns on Earth.
• Explain the influence of convection, global winds and the jet stream on weather and climatic conditions.
• Explain the relationship between the movement of air masses, high and low pressure systems, and frontal boundaries to storms (including thunderstorms, hurricanes, and tornadoes) and other weather conditions that may result.
• Identify and investigate cause-and-effect relationships to explain scientific phenomena or analyze problems.
• Identify global patterns of atmospheric movement and how they influence local weather.
• Identify how global patterns of atmospheric movement influence local weather using weather maps that show high and low pressures and fronts.
• Identify the role of natural events in altering Earth systems.
• Identify the role of natural events in altering Earth systems. Cycles within Sun, Earth, and Moon systems are studied as students learn about seasons, tides, and lunar phases.
• Identify the role of the oceans in the formation of weather systems such as hurricanes.
• Know that weather conditions are variable and can be predicted within probabilistic ranges.
• Model and illustrate how the tilted Earth rotates on its axis, causing day and night, and revolves around the Sun, causing changes in seasons.
• Plan and implement comparative and descriptive investigations by making observations, asking well defined questions, and using appropriate equipment and technology.
• Predict weather conditions and patterns based on information obtained from weather data collected from direct observations and measurements.
• Recognize cycles within Sun, Earth, and Moon systems that impact the seasons and the tides.
• Recognize how interactions in solar, weather, and ocean systems create changes in weather patterns and climate.
• Recognize that climate can be impacted by natural events and human activities.
• Recognize that human activities, such as the release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth's mean surface temperature (global warming).
• Recognize that the Sun provides the energy that drives convection within the atmosphere and oceans, producing winds.
• Recognize that weather and climate are influenced by interactions involving sunlight and these interactions vary with latitude and altitude.
• Understand how cloud shapes, types, and elevation predict weather conditions and patterns and associated elevation.
• Understand how the cycling of matter (water and gases) in and out of the atmosphere relates to Earth's atmosphere, weather and climate and the effects of the atmosphere on humans.
• Use appropriate tools, and other necessary equipment to collect, record, and analyze information.

Unit 1: The Wanderer

LA

Language Arts

• Increase reading and writing vocabulary through wide reading.
• Analyze the effects of the author's craft on the reader/viewer/listener.
• Analyze word choice using critical and evaluative processes.
• Contrast the actions, motives (e.g., loyalty, selfishness, conscientiousness), and appearances of characters in a work of fiction and discuss the importance of the contrasts to the plot or theme.
• Create artistic interpretations that connect self to the written work.
• Create complex sentences for clarity.
• Demonstrate an understanding of conventional written and spoken expression by using a variety of sentence types correctly, punctuating them properly, and avoiding fragments and run-ons.
• Demonstrate the different roles of the parts of speech in sentence construction.
• Determine the effect of literary devices on the reader.
• Determine the impact of word choice on written and spoken language.
• Determine the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary words by using context clues or a dictionary.
• Discuss and analyze the effects of figurative language.
• Elaborate information and ideas in writing by using prepositional phrases.
• Evaluate the author's use of various techniques, such as point of view, to influence readers' perspectives.
• Examine alternate perspectives.
• Examine relationships among characters.
• Explain and evaluate relationships that are temporal.
• Explain relationships that are causal.
• Explore argumentative works that are read, heard and/or viewed by making connections among works, self and related topics.
• Explore informational materials that are read, heard, and/or viewed by monitoring comprehension for understanding of what is read, heard, and/or viewed and restating and summarizing information.
• Exploring a variety of sources from which information may be attained.
• Identify and correctly us modifiers.
• Increase fluency, comprehension, and insight by reading and discussing literature.
• Interact with text before reading by seeking additional information.
• Interpreting text by explaining elements such as point of view, characterization, and style.
• Make and evaluate inferences and conclusions about characters, events, and themes.
• Narrate an expressive account (e.g., fictional or autobiographical) that uses a coherent organizing structure appropriate to purpose, audience, and context; tells a story or establishes the significance of an event or events; and uses remembered feelings and specific details.
• Narrate an expressive account (e.g., fictional or autobiographical), which uses a coherent organizing structure appropriate to purpose, audience, and context.
• Narrate an expressive account which uses remembered feelings and specific details.
• Narrate an expressive account, which tells a story or establishes the significance of an event or events.
• Produce final drafts that demonstrate accurate spelling and the correct use of punctuation and capitalization.
• Recognize underlying messages in order to identify theme(s) within and across works.
• Respond to fiction by examining relationships among characters.
• Select key vocabulary critical to the text and apply appropriate meanings as necessary for comprehension.
• Understand and explain the figurative and metaphorical use of words in context.
• Understand that theme refers to the meaning or moral of a selection and recognize themes (whether implied or stated directly) in sample works.
• Use adjectives and adverbs effectively in writing.
• Uses a range of appropriate strategies (e.g., dialogue, suspense, movement, gestures, expressions).
• Write prepositions and prepositional phrases to convey location, time, direction, or to provide details.

Science

• Recognize underlying messages in order to identify theme within and across works. (LA)

Social Studies

• Locate and label geographical locations on a map.

Unit 2: Geography and Landforms

Social Studies

Social Studies

• Analyze how absolute and relative location influence ways of living in the United States and other countries of North America.
• Analyze the past movement of people, goods, and ideas and compare it to movement today.
• Describe and locate the absolute and relative locations of major landforms and bodies of water.
• Describe factors that influence changes in distribution of population and resources in countries and evaluate their impact on the environment.
• Describe factors that influence changes in distribution of pulsations and resources in countries and evaluate their impact on the environment.
• Describe factors that influence changes in distribution patterns of population.
• Describe the deposition of eroded material and its importance in establishing landforms including deltas and flood plains.
• Describe the economic and social differences between developed and developing regions in North America.
• Discuss and analyze how humans influence erosion and deposition in local communities as a result of activities like clearing land, planting vegetation, or building dams or other water-altering structures.
• Discuss and consider the wearing away and movement of rock and soil in erosion and its importance in forming canyons and valleys.
• Discuss how the flow of water and the slope of land affect erosion.
• Examine factors such as climate, location of resources, and environment challenges and assess their significance in the development of cultures.
• Examine factors that influence human migration.
• Explain how and why population distribution differs within and between countries of North America.
• Explain how people adapt to, modify, and use their physical environments.
• Explain how people of the United States and other countries of North America adapt to, modify, and use their physical environment.
• Identify and analyze forces that cause change in landforms over time, including water and ice, wind, and gravity.
• Identify and use models and maps as a way of representing landforms.
• Identify and use models and maps as ways of representing landforms.
• Identify key physical characteristics such as landforms, water forms, and climate and evaluate their influence on the development of a culture.
• Identify key physical characteristics such as landforms, water forms, and climate.
• Know that natural resources, including water, can be limited and can be affected by human actions.
• Know the origin of the water used by local communities.
• Understand that the amount of fresh water located in rivers, lakes, underground sources, and glaciers is limited and that its availability can be extended by recycling and decreasing the use of water.

Unit 2: The People of Sparks

LA

Language Arts

• Analyze media as sources for information, entertainment, persuasion, interpretation of events, and transmission of culture.
• Analyze the effect of the quality of the characters on the conflict.
• Anticipate and address reader's concerns and counterarguments.
• Consider alternative points of view or reasons.
• Consider the difference in techniques used in media.
• Construct a critical response/review of a work/topic.
• Create multi-paragraph compositions.
• Create simple documents using a thesaurus.
• Demonstrate understanding in speaking and writing by using subjective, nominative, objective, and possessive pronouns.
• Determine the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary words by using context clues or a thesaurus.
• Determine, locate, and explore the full range of relevant sources addressing a research question and systematically record the information gathered.
• Develop an interpretation exhibiting careful reading, understanding, and insight.
• Edit and revise manuscripts to improve the meaning and focus of writing by adding, deleting, consolidating, clarifying, and rearranging words and sentences.
• Explain the roles and functions of characters in various plots, including their relationships and conflicts.
• Exploring relationships between and among characters, ideas, concepts and/or experiences.
• Extend understanding by creating products for different purposes, different audiences, and within various contexts.
• Generate a research plan for gathering relevant information about the major research question.
• Identify the main problem or conflict of the plot and explain how it is resolved.
• Interact with text by making predictions.
• Make informed judgments about television, radio, video/film productions, other electronic media and/or print formats.
• Organize the interpretation around several clear ideas, premises, or images.
• Recognize the antecedent and correct pronoun case in writing.
• Recognize the sequence of events that leads up to a problem.
• Revise writing to improve the organization and consistency of ideas within and between paragraphs.
• State a clear position on a proposition or proposal.
• Support the position with organized and relevant evidence.
• Use a thesaurus to identify alternative word choices and meanings.
• Use commas when linking two clauses with a conjunction in compound sentences.
• Use conjunctions to connect ideas.
• Use oral and written language to influence the thinking of others.
• Use pronouns correctly in speaking and writing, including clear antecedents and correct case.
• Write research reports about important ideas, issues, or events by using the following guidelines: frame questions that direct the investigation, establish a controlling idea or topic, and develop the topic with simple facts, details, examples, and explanations.

Unit 3: Our Changing Earth

Science

Science

• Analyze evidence to explain observations, make inferences and predictions, and develop the relationship between evidence and explanation.
• Design and conduct investigations to demonstrate an understanding of scientific inquiry.
• Identify and observe effects of events that require time for changes to be noticeable, including growth, erosion, dissolving, weathering and flow.
• Identify and observe effects of events that require time for changes to be noticeable, including growth, erosion, dissolving, weathering, and flow.
• Identify past events that led to the formation of the Earth's renewable, non-renewable, and inexhaustible resources, including coal, oil, gas, and minerals.
• Interpret how land forms are the result of a combination of constructive and destructive forces such as deposition of sediment and weathering.
• Interpret how landforms are the result of a combination of constructive and destructive forces such as deposition of sediment and weathering.
• Know how to explain major features of their area's geology (including mountains, faults, volcanoes) in terms of plate tectonics.
• Know that beaches are dynamic systems in which the sand is supplied by rivers and moved along the coast by the action of waves.
• Know that Earth is composed of several layers: a cold, brittle lithosphere; a hot, convecting mantle; and a dense, metallic core.
• Know that earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, landslides, and floods change human and wildlife habitats.
• Know that lithospheric plates the size of continents and oceans move at rates of centimeters per year in response to movements in the mantle.
• Know that major geologic events, such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and mountain building, result from plate motions.
• Know that moving water erodes landforms, reshaping the land by taking it away from some places and depositing it as pebbles, sand, silt, and mud in other places (weathering, transport, and deposition).
• Know that natural processes, including freezing, thawing, and root growth, cause rocks to break down into smaller pieces.
• Know that plate tectonics accounts for important features of Earth's surface and major geologic events.
• Know that some changes in the Earth are due to slow processes, such as erosion, and some changes are due to rapid processes, such as landslides, volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes.
• Know that the effects of an earthquake on any region vary, depending on the size of the earthquake, the distance of the region from the epicenter, the local geology, and the type of construction in the region.
• Understand that earthquakes are sudden motions along breaks in the crust called faults and that volcanoes and fissures are locations where magma reaches the surface.

Unit 3: Short Stories

LA

Language Arts

• Ask questions that seek information.
• Clarify understanding of text by creating reports.
• Compose a variety of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama using self-selected topics.
• Discuss literature in teacher-student conferences and small group discussions.
• Discuss print and non-print expressive works formally and informally.
• Establish and develop a plot, setting, and present a point of view that is appropriate to the stories.
• Explain different forms of third-person points of view in stories.
• Explore what impact literary elements have on the meaning of the text such as the influence of setting or the problem and its resolution.
• Frame questions that direct analysis and investigation.
• Identify and explain the point of view in a written work.
• Identify elements of fiction and nonfiction and support by referencing the text to determine the plot development and author's choice of words.
• Identify elements of fiction and nonfiction and support by referencing the text to determine the plot development.
• Identify the speaker and recognize the difference between first- and third-person narration.
• Include sensory details and concrete language to develop plot and character.
• Increase fluency, comprehension, and insight through a meaningful and comprehensive literacy program by using effective reading strategies to match type of text.
• Interact with the text by formulating questions.
• Interpret how personal circumstances and backgrounds shape interaction with text.
• Interpret text by explaining elements such as characterization.
• Interpret text by explaining elements such as plot.
• Interpret text by explaining point of view.
• Listen actively and critically by asking questions, evaluating information and ideas, making inferences, and drawing conclusions.
• Make connections within and between texts by recognizing similarities and differences based on a common lesson, character, theme, or message.
• Make reasonable assertions about a text through accurate, supporting citations.
• Narrate an expressive account that uses remembered feelings and specific details.
• Pose relevant questions.
• Produce work that follows the conventions of particular genres.
• Read a variety of literature and other text.
• Read independently from self-selected materials.
• Recognize and develop the role of a critic by constructing a critical response/review of a work/topic.
• Understand, make inferences, and draw conclusions about the structure and elements of a story.
• Use a range of narrative devices (such as dialogue and suspense).
• Use a variety of sentence types correctly, punctuate them properly, and avoid fragments and run-ons.
• Use phrases and clauses correctly.
• Use quotation marks around the exact words of a speaker.
• Write multi-step directions.