• Make a quantitative and/or qualitative claim regarding the relationship between dependent and independent variables.

• Construct and revise an explanation based on valid and reliable evidence obtained from a variety of sources (including students’ own investigations, models, theories, simulations, peer review) and the assumption that theories and laws that describe the natural world operate today as they did in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

• Apply scientific ideas, principles, and/or evidence to provide an explanation of phenomena and solve design problems, taking into account possible unanticipated effects.

• Apply scientific reasoning, theory, and/or models to link evidence to the claims to assess the extent to which the reasoning and data support the explanation or conclusion.

• Design, evaluate, and/or refine a solution to a complex real-world problem, based on scientific knowledge, student-generated sources of evidence, prioritized.

Performance Standards

• HS-LS1 – FROM MOLECULES TO ORGANISMS: STRUCTURES AND PROCESSES

  • HS-LS1-5: Use a model to illustrate how photosynthesis transforms light energy into stored chemical energy.

  • HS-LS1-6: Construct and revise an explanation based on evidence for how carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen from sugar molecules may combine with other elements to form amino acids and/or other large carbon-based molecules.

  • HS-LS1-7: Use a model to illustrate that cellular respiration is a chemical process whereby the bonds of food molecules and oxygen molecules are broken and the bonds in new compounds are formed resulting in a net transfer of energy.

• HS-LS2 – ECOSYSTEMS: INTERACTIONS, ENERGY, AND DYNAMICS

  • HS-LS2-1: Use mathematical and/or computational representations to support explanations of factors that affect carrying capacity of ecosystems at different scales.

  • HS-LS2-4: Use mathematical representations to support claims for the cycling of matter and flow of energy among organisms in an ecosystem.

  • HS-LS2-5: Develop a model to illustrate the role of photosynthesis and cellular respiration in the cycling of carbon among the biosphere, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere.

Disciplinary Core Ideas

• None for Biology

Performance Standards

• HS-PS1 – MATTER AND ITS INTERACTIONS

  • HS-PS1-1: Use the periodic table as a model to predict the relative properties of elements based on the patterns of electrons in the outermost energy level of atoms.

  • HS-PS1-6: Refine the design of a chemical system by specifying a change in conditions that would produce increased amounts of products at equilibrium.

  • HS-PS1-7: Use mathematical representations to support the claim that atoms, and therefore mass, are conserved during a chemical reaction.

Disciplinary Core Ideas

• PS3: ENERGY

  • PS3.D: Energy in Chemical Processes and Everyday Life

    • Although energy cannot be destroyed, it can be converted to less useful forms—for example, to thermal energy in the surrounding environment.

    • Solar cells are human-made devices that likewise capture the sun’s energy and produce electrical energy.

    • The main way that solar energy is captured and stored on Earth is through the complex chemical process known as photosynthesis.

    • Nuclear Fusion processes in the center of the sun release the energy that ultimately reaches Earth as radiation.

Performance Standards

• HS-PS2 – MOTION AND STABILITY: FORCES AND INTERACTIONS

  • HS-PS2-2: Use mathematical representations to support the claim that the total momentum of a system of objects is conserved when there is no net force on the system.

• HS-PS3 – ENERGY

  • HS-PS3-1: Create a computational model to calculate the change in the energy of one component in a system when the change in energy of the other component(s) and energy flows in and out of the system are known.

  • HS-PS3-2: Develop and use models to illustrate that energy at the macroscopic scale can be accounted for as a combination of energy associated with the motions of particles (objects) and energy associated with the relative position of particles (objects).

Disciplinary Core Ideas

• PS3: ENERGY

  • PS3.B: Conservation of Energy and Energy Transfer

    • Conservation of energy means that the total change of energy in any system is always equal to the total energy transferred into or out of the system.

    • Energy cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be transported from one place to another and transferred between systems.

    • Mathematical expressions, which quantify how the stored energy in a system depends on its configuration (e.g. relative positions of charged particles, compression of a spring) and how kinetic energy depends on mass and speed, allow the concept of conservation of energy to be used to predict and describe system behavior.

    • The availability of energy limits what can occur in any system.

    • Uncontrolled systems always evolve toward more stable states—that is, toward more uniform energy distribution (e.g., water flows downhill, objects hotter than their surrounding environment cool down).

  • PS3.C: Relationship Between Energy and Forces

    • When two objects interacting through a field change relative position, the energy stored in the field is changed.