Science Curriculum Preview Committee Clarification of Learning Results

Curriculum Organizing Questions	What is weather? Is the weather the same every day? How many different kinds of weather can you name? What are some things that happen when weather changes?
Elaboration	Students can start to keep daily records of temperature (hot, cold, pleasant) and precipitation (none, some, lots), and plot them by week, month, and years. It is enough for students to spot the pattern of ups and downs, without getting deeply into the nature of climate. Some factors to generally discuss are temperature, wind and precipitation. Benchmarks p. 67
Specific Ideas	Earth's weather changes from day to day and over the seasons. Changes in temperature cause different weather.
Developmental & Instructional Implications	Young children are naturally interested in everything they see around them -- soil, rocks, streams, rain, snow, clouds, rainbows, sun, moon, and stars. During the first years of school, they should be encouraged to observe closely the objects and materials in their environment, note their properties, distinguish one from another and develop their own explanations of how things become the way they are. As children become more familiar with their world, they can be guided to observe changes, including cyclic changes, predictalbe trends, and less consistent changes, such as weather. NSES p. 130
Examples	Chart weather conditions and compare and contrast changes over time.

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