Lessons and Standards

7th Grade Summary 

Through the 7th-grade program, students gain an understanding of climate change, including its causes and the actions they can take to combat it now and in the future.

During their field trip to the Living Lab, students build a foundational understanding of climate change, investigate how electricity is produced and identify the point in the process where carbon emissions occur. Through hands-on exploration of the Living Lab, students discover green building strategies in action—such as solar power, energy-efficient lighting, and thoughtful material choices—that reduce carbon emissions. Students also experiment with wave-energy-powered turbines to see how clean, renewable energy can replace fossil-fuel-generated power in the future.

During Make a Difference Day in their classroom, students learn practical ways to reduce their carbon footprint. They work with peers to analyze whether using a reusable water bottle is a truly sustainable choice and create reuseable cleaning products for their classroom, reinforcing the importance of reducing waste and emissions through everyday actions.

The 7th-grade program empowers students to understand climate change, explore solutions, and take meaningful steps toward reducing their personal carbon footprint.

NGSS Alignment:

Performance Expectations:

  • MS-ESS3-3. Apply scientific principles to design a method for monitoring and minimizing a human impact on the environment.
  • MS-ESS3-5. Ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperature over the past century.

Disciplinary Core Ideas:

  • ESS2.D: Global Climate Change
  • ETS1.A: Defining and Delimiting an Engineering Problem
  • ETS1.B: Developing Possible Solutions

Cross-Cutting Concept:

  • Cause and Effect – Cause and effect relationships may be used to predict phenomena in natural or designed systems.
  • Systems and Systems models – Students understand that a system is a group of related parts that make up a whole and can carry out functions its individual parts cannot. They can also describe a system in terms of its components and their interactions.
  • Stability and Change – Stability might be disturbed either by sudden events or gradual changes that accumulate over time.

Classroom Lessons:

Schedules

Additional Resources