Unit #: 3 – Interacting Earth Systems

Grade: 5

Unit of Study:Interacting Earth Systems

PE’s:5-ESS2-15-ESS2-25-ESS3-13-5-ETS1-13-5-ETS1-2

Storyline:Students make models of the flow of energy and matter at the scale of the entire planet, and obtain information about a few example phenomena. They describe these phenomena in terms of interactions between different systems within the broader Earth system. They use their models to understand how humans impact these systems and develop solutions to minimize these effects.

DCI’s:ESS2.AESS2.CESS3.CETS1.AETS1.B

Anchoring Phenomena:Earth systems interact and are change by natural and human impact.

SEP’s:Developing and Using ModelsUsing Mathematics and Computational ThinkingAsking Questions and Defining ProblemsObtaining, Evaluating, and Communicating Information

Essential Questions:1. How can we represent systems as complicated as the entire planet? 2. Where does my tap water come from and where does it go? 3. How much water do we need to live, to irrigate plants?

CC’s:Systems and System ModelsScale Proportion and Quantity

4. How much water do we have? 5. What can we do to protect Earth’s resources?

Suggested

Phenomena

Performance

Expectation(PE)

Disciplinary Core

Idea (DCI)

Suggested Activity

Science & Engr.

Practices (SEP)

Crosscutting

Concepts (CCC)

Four Spheres1

What makes each sphere unique but part of a larger system?

5-ESS2-1 ESS2.A Take students outside to observe. Have them list everything that they see. In the classroom, have them group items on their lists however they choose. Show pictures of four spheres and have students regroup their items and cut out magazine pictures to create collages of the four spheres.

Developing and Using Models

Systems and System Models

Rain Shadow

What causes

5-ESS2-1 ESS2.A Have students complete rain shadow activity to show interactions between spheres. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1EcRksEmKY

Have students choose another phenomenon to research. They

Developing and Using Models

Systems and System Models

the rain shadow?

should make a model of this phenomenon to show interactions between the spheres.

Water Cycle

Where can water be found on Earth?

5-ESS2-2 ESS2.C Have students complete the Project Wet water cycle game to understand the water cycle. http://files.dnr.state.mn.us/education_safety/education/project_wet/sample_activity.pdf

There is also a video version here:http://www.discoverwater.org/blue-traveler/

Have students compare their journey to a traditional water cycle model and note the differences.

Using Mathematics and Computational Thinking

Scale, Proportion, and Quantity

Water Cycle

Where can water be found on Earth?

5-ESS2-2 ESS2.C Then give students model of California and have them fill in where fresh and salt water is located on the map.

Students graph fresh and salt water on a world map and compare to their California map the differences of fresh and salt water.

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Water_in_California#/See_also

http://static.nsta.org/files/sc1509_16.pdf

Using Mathematics and Computational Thinking

Scale, Proportion, and Quantity

Water Cycle

Where can water

3-5-ETS1-1 ETS1.A Create a map of storm water flow on campus. Include data on the volume of water that is fallen. Create a presentation using the map and data to deliver to Student Body. Then design a water filtration system for the water flow to be more useful throughout the school.

Asking Questions and Defining Problems

be found on Earth?Pacific Trash Vortex

How does the trash get there?

How can it be stopped and/or removed?

5-ESS3-13-5-ETS1-2

ESS3.CETS1.B

Use the 5E lesson plan2 on human impacts to show how humans can have positive and negative effects on the Earth. Students will design ways in which trash can be reduced, reused, and recycled.

Obtaining, Evaluating, and Communicating Information

Constructing Explanations and Designing Solutions

Systems and System Models

1. Four Spheres

2. Suggested 5-E Lesson Plan created by 5th Grade CLT/TL (Kelly/SWP)- Human Impact on the environment

Conceptual Flow

TLC Team Planning

Lesson Sequence Concept:

Performance Expectation: Earth and Human Activity: 5-ESS3-1: Obtain and combine information about ways individual communities use science ideas to protect the Earth's resources and environment

DCI: ESS3: C: Human Impacts on Earth's Systems: Human activities in agriculture, industry, and everyday life have had major effects on the land, vegetation, streams, ocean, air, and even outer space. But individuals and communities are doing things to help protect Earth's resources and environments.

Practices: Obtain and combine information from books and/or other reliable media to explain phenomena or solutions to a design problem.

Cross Cutting Concept: Cause and effect- events that occur together with regularity might or might not be a cause and effect relationship.

Phenomena: Pacific Trash Vortex (Northern Pacific Gyre)

Teacher Does Student Does Concepts

Engage: Show picture of garbage and the water ways.

1. What do you see?2. Where do you think this is?3. How did it get here?

______4. Based on the interactions of the

four spheres, draw/label a model that would explain how the bag traveled from Tracy to the ocean?

1. Write in journal/partner share answers

2. Create a model showing the travel of a plastic bag from Tracy to the ocean.

3. With a different color. Share/add/change/remove one thing to their model after sharing.

DCI: systems interact in multiple ways to affect Earth's surface materials and processes. The ocean supports a variety of ecosystems and organisms. SEP: Develop a model using an example to describe a scientific principle. CCC: A system can be described in terms of its components and their interactions.

Explore #1 Connect Slat's idea to ways we can prevent the Pacific garbage patch Vortex from increasing. What are positive human impacts?--------How is what Slat doing impacting the environment?-------Looking around your classroom, what

1. Watch video showing visuals of the Ocean Cleanup Project and think about question about Slat impacting environment.

2. Discuss what they noticed about the video.

--------3. Read the article on Slat's clean up

efforts and highlight positive human impacts.

DCI: Individuals and communities are doing things to help and support Earth's Resources SEP: Obtain and combine information from books and/or other reliable media to explain phenomena or solutions to a design problemCCC: Patterns of change can be used to make predictions

items could you replace by reusing these recyclables in new ways?

4. Look at image of the top 10 pieces of trash.

-------5. Complete the reuse chart with

group.Explain #1 Connect to Boyen Slat REDUCING and making a positive human impact by cleaning our oceans. Choose 1 item that your group can share out. How could your solution/ideas have a long term effect for the environment? Next time you see trash, think about how you can make a positive impact for our environment

Choose 1 item on the chart and design a solutions of how that item could be reused to better impact the environment. Explain the reusable item and its use that was created. Think of how your idea has a long term effect on your environment. (write on the back).Share out

Create a solution to prevent the effects of human activity from contributing to the growing garbage vortex in the Pacific Ocean

Elaborate Evaluate

Prior Lesson: Talk about the life of an item from start to finish (creates a big idea of the human impact)

Plastic shampoo bottle from the manufacture, delivery, to shelf, ...then now in the ocean

Twenty-Year-Old Boyan Slat Takes On The Monumental Task Of Cleaning Our Oceans

By Sarah Benton Feitlinger on September 26, 2015Photo Credit: Boyanslat.com

Most 20-year-olds are still trying to figure out what they want to do in life. Not Boyan Slat. Ever since he was 16-years old, the Dutch teenager has had one mission - To clean up the trillions of pieces of plastic that are polluting our oceans and killing precious marine life. What's amazing is that this young man who started with what sounded like an outlandish dream may actually be able to pull off this gargantuan task!

Slat's first exposure to ocean garbage came during a diving vacation in Greece. The teenager was stunned to see that there was more plastic on the beaches than fishes in the sea. Upon completing high school, he started to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming an Aerospace Engineer. However, he could never erase the images of the plastic debris from his mind.

So in 2013, Slat dropped out of college and established The Ocean Cleanup Foundation. Its mission was to create an environmentally friendly large-scale and efficient way to remove the plastic pollution from aquatic ecosystems while increasing awareness by simultaneously communicating this process intensively.

Within a year, the determined youngster and his team of 100 volunteer scientists and engineers from all around the world managed to come up with a 530-page feasibility study that laid out the technology and the financial needs for such a concept to be viable.

Called the "Ocean Cleanup Project," it did not entail chasing after every piece of floating plastic. Instead, the plan focused on the five "garbage" patches that have been accumulated by rotating ocean currents or gyres in specific areas. According to experts, the five harbor about 5.25 trillion of the 8 trillion pieces of plastic estimated to be floating around the world's oceans today.

Slat's team hypothesized that if we create a stationary collection area around each one, the plastic could be picked up in an economical and efficient manner. The plan was convincing enough to raise the team close to $2.2 million USD in a crowdfunding campaign.

Photo Credit: OEX

But before any clean-up could begin, the environmentalists needed to get an idea of what they were up against. So on July 23rd, a fleet of 30 small boats and a 171-ft long mother ship called Ocean Starr, set out towards the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The 500-mile long area of toxic plastic waste that extends from California to the Sea of Japan is the largest of the five ocean garbage accumulation zones.

The "Mega Expedition," that covered 3,500,000 km, or 2,174,799 miles of ocean measured the trash in various ways. Manta trawls (net systems for sampling the surface of the water) were attached to each boat, allowing the environmentalists to collect samples as they drifted along.

A sighting app and a high altitude balloon fixed to Ocean Starr gave the researchers an idea of the number of bigger pieces of trash, like abandoned buoys and fishing nets that are floating around. During the month-long expedition that ended in San Francisco on August 23rd the team collected more data than experts have been able to in 40 years.Photo Credit: theoceancleanup.com

The Ocean Cleanup Project plans to test its technology with a small task off the shores of Japan in 2016. If all goes well, they will embark on the arduous chore of cleaning up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The team estimates it will take ten years to extract just 42% of the plastic that is currently floating around the area.

So how will Slat's team retrieve the garbage? By using a system of strategically placed floating barriers that will collect the plastic brought in by the ocean currents, similar to how the waves carry trash to shore. The collected debris will be moved to a storage area with the help of a solar-powered conveyor belt. Every 45 days or so, a ship will be dispatched to retrieve the collected garbage and bring it ashore. Since the system does not require nets, there is no chance of harming wildlife in the process. As for the accumulated plastic? It will be recycled into oil, which can be sold to help offset some of the costs associated with the project.

Image Credit: Oceanconservancy.org

To ensure that our oceans remain clean, the Foundation plans to create programs to educate and raise recycling awareness. The team is also trying to develop technology to intercept the plastic and other garbage in rivers and smaller waterways before it enters the ocean.

Even if the young social entrepreneur is partially successful, it will be a huge step in the right direction. According to experts, plastic debris does more than kill about a million seabirds and over one hundred thousand marine animals each year. It also costs the fishing and tourism industries about $13 billion dollars in clean-up costs each year. And even worse, the accumulation of toxic chemicals released by plastic in the sea has started to enter our food chain through fish and is now being linked to the rise in diseases like cancer. Image Credit: NOAA.gov

While the statistics are dire, the good news is that we can all help eliminate the problem. All we have to do is take responsibility and practice the three RRR's - Reuse, Recycle, and most importantly, Reduce

Suggested 5E Lesson Sequence –

Lesson Sequence Concept:

Performance Expectation:

Practices:

DCI :

Cross Cutting Concept:

Phenomena:

Teacher Does Student Does Concepts

Engage: ESR:

Explore: ESR:

Explain: ESR:

Explore:

Explain:

Reading

(see below)

Have students read.

Use close reading strategy.

Extend/Elaborate:

ESR:

Evaluate:

Revisit Essential Questions

Ask students to answer the essential question again drawing a line of learning using what they learned today.

ESR:

Students answer questions based on what they've learned or complete a project.