Grade 4 Science Tennessee standards Standards

Earth’s Place in the Universe

Generate and support a claim with evidence that over long periods of time, erosion (i.e., weathering and transportation) and deposition have changed landscapes and created new landforms.

Use evidence from the presence and location of fossils to determine the order in which rock strata were formed.

Earth’s Systems

Collect and analyze data from observations to provide evidence that rocks, soils, and sediments are broken into smaller pieces through mechanical weathering (e.g., frost wedging, abrasion, tree root wedging) and are transported by water, ice, wind, gravity, and vegetation.

Explain how data from maps and other reliable sources can be used to determine patterns for the locations of mountain ranges, deep ocean trenches, volcanoes, and earthquakes.

Provide examples to support the claim that organisms affect the physical characteristics of their regions (e.g., plants’ roots hold soil in place, beaver shelters alter the flow of water, paved surfaces affect runoff, leaves from trees can obstruct waterways).

Earth and Human Activity

Obtain and combine information to describe that energy, fuels, and materials are derived from natural resources and that some resources are renewable (e.g., sunlight, wind, water) and some are not (e.g., fossil fuels and minerals).

Engage in an argument, using evidence from research, that human activity (e.g., farming, mining, building) can affect the land and ocean in positive and/or negative ways.

Engineering Design

Categorize the effectiveness of design solutions by testing and comparing them to specified criteria and constraints.

Links Among Engineering, Technology, Science, and Society

Explain how existing technologies have been designed or improved to increase their benefits, to decrease known risks, and to meet societal demands (e.g., artificial limbs, seatbelts, cell phones).

Ecosystems: Interactions, Energy, and Dynamics

Develop and use models to illustrate the flow of matter through a food web/food chain beginning with sunlight and including producers, consumers, and decomposers.

Using information about the roles of organisms (producers, consumers, decomposers) in an ecosystem, evaluate how those roles are interconnected in a food web, and communicate how the organisms are continuously able to meet their needs in a stable food web.

Develop and use models to determine the effects of introducing a species to, or removing a species from, an ecosystem and how either one can damage the balance of an ecosystem.

Analyze and interpret data about changes in the environment to explain how some organisms may survive and reproduce, some may not survive, others move to new locations, yet others move into the transformed environment.

Biological Change: Unity and Diversity

Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information about what a fossil is and ways a fossil can provide information about the past, such as a) the nature of environments and b) animals that existed long ago but no longer exist.

Energy

Use evidence to explain the cause and effect relationship between the speed of an object and the energy of an object.

Carry out an investigation to show how faster speeds during a collision can cause a bigger change in the shape of the colliding objects.

Describe how stored energy can be converted into another form for practical use in a system.

Waves and their Application in Technologies for Information Transfer

Use a model of a simple wave to describe amplitude, wavelength, and explain how waves can add or cancel each other as they cross.

Construct an explanation for how the colors of available light sources and the bending of light waves determine what we see.

Investigate how lenses enhance human senses and digital devices (e.g., computers and cell phones) use waves to receive and decode information over distances.

Algorithmic Thinking

Examine logical reasoning to predict outcomes of an algorithm.

Use flowcharts to create a plan or algorithm.

Construct a basic system of numbers, letters, or symbols to represent information as a cipher.

Data Analysis

Collect, organize, analyze, and interpret data to identify solutions and/or make informed decisions.

Gather data to answer a question using a variety of computing and data visualization methods.

Earth's Place in the Universe

Generate and support a claim with evidence that over long periods of time, erosion (weathering and transportation) and deposition have changed landscapes and created new landforms.

Use a model to explain how the orbit of the Earth and sun cause observable patterns: a. day and night; b. changes in length and direction of shadows over a day.

Earth's Systems

Collect and analyze data from observations to provide evidence that rocks, soils, and sediments are broken into smaller pieces through mechanical weathering (frost wedging, abrasion, tree root wedging) and are transported by water, ice, wind, gravity, and vegetation.

Interpret maps to determine that the location of mountain ranges, deep ocean trenches, volcanoes, and earthquakes occur in patterns.

Provide examples to support the claim that organisms affect the physical characteristics of their regions.

Analyze and interpret data on the four layers of the Earth, including thickness, composition, and physical states of these layers.

Earth and Human Activity

Obtain and combine information to describe that energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and that some energy and fuel sources are renewable (sunlight, wind, water) and some are not (fossil fuels, minerals).

Create an argument, using evidence from research, that human activity (farming, mining, building) can affect the land and ocean in positive and/or negative ways.

Engineering Design

Categorize the effectiveness of design solutions by comparing them to specified criteria for constraints.

Links Among Engineering, Technology, Science, and Society

Use appropriate tools and measurements to build a model.

Determine the effectiveness of multiple solutions to a design problem given the criteria and the constraints.

Explain how engineers have improved existing technologies to increase their benefits, to decrease known risks, and to meet societal demands (artificial limbs, seatbelts, cell phones).

Foundational Concepts

Demonstrate an appropriate level of proficiency in performing tasks using a range of digital devices.

Use age-appropriate online tools and resources (e.g., learning management systems, grade and assignment record, tutorial, assessment, web browser).

Create a simple digital model of a system and explain what the model shows and does not show.

Impacts of Computing

Identify laws and tools which help ensure that users of varying abilities can access electronic and information technology.

Explain how hardware and applications can enable everyone, including people with disabilities, to do things they could not do otherwise.

Ecosystems: Interactions, Energy, and Dynamics

Support an argument with evidence that plants get the materials they need for growth and reproduction chiefly through a process in which they use carbon dioxide from the air, water, and energy from the sun to produce sugars, plant materials, and waste (oxygen); and that this process is called photosynthesis.

Develop models of terrestrial and aquatic food chains to describe the movement of energy among producers, herbivores, carnivores, omnivores, and decomposers.

Using information about the roles of organisms (producers, consumers, decomposers), evaluate how those roles in food chains are interconnected in a food web, and communicate how the organisms are continuously able to meet their needs in a stable food web.

Develop and use models to determine the effects of introducing a species to, or removing a species from, an ecosystem and how either one can damage the balance of an ecosystem.

Analyze and interpret data about changes (land characteristics, water distribution, temperature, food, and other organisms) in the environment and describe what mechanisms organisms can use to affect their ability to survive and reproduce.

Biological Change: Unity and Diversity

Obtain information about what a fossil is and ways a fossil can provide information about the past.

Networking and the Internet

Identify appropriate and inappropriate uses of communication technology and discuss the permanence of actions in the digital world.

Conduct advanced keyword searches to produce valid, appropriate results and evaluate results for accuracy, relevance, and appropriateness.

Programming Concepts

Test and debug a given program in a block-based visual programming environment using arithmetic operators, conditionals, and repetition in programs, in collaboration with others.

Energy

Use evidence to explain the cause and effect relationship between the speed of an object and the energy of an object.

Observe and explain the relationship between potential energy and kinetic energy.

Describe how stored energy can be converted into another form for practical use.

Waves and their Application in Technologies for Information Transfer

Use a model of a simple wave to explain regular patterns of amplitude, wavelength, and direction.

Describe how the colors of available light sources and the bending of light waves determine what we see.

Investigate how lenses and digital devices like computers or cell phones use waves to enhance human senses.