Roselawn Elementary School
1st Grade Science Units and Learning Targets
Unit 1 Living and Non Living 13 Days
Essential Question: What are the connections between living and non-living in various
environments?
Learning Targets
1. The students will classify things as living and nonliving. (SC.F.4.4)
2. The students will explain that living things need food, water, space, and shelter to survive.
(SC.F.4.4)
3. The students will explain why living things need food, water, space, and shelter to survive.
(SC.F.4.4)
4. The students will give examples of plants and animals that live in a particular habitat.
(SC.F.4.4)
5. The students will list the characteristics of the climate in different habitats. (SC.F.4.4)
6. The students will match characteristics of different environments and the plants and animals
that live there. (SC.F.4.4)
Unit 2 Habitats 13 Days
Essential Question: How can students’ conceptual understanding foster connections with
habitats and survival?
Learning Targets
1. The students will give examples of plants and animals that live in a particular
habitat.(SC.F.4.1)
2. The students will list the characteristics of the climate in different habitats. (SC.F. 4.1)
3. The students will match characteristics of different environments and the plants and animals
that live there. (SC.F. 4.1)
Unit 3 How Plants and Animals Live 13 Days
Essential Question: How do living things meet their basic needs?
Learning Targets
1. The students will identify that plants and animals have adaptations that help them survive in
the environment (camouflage, teeth, and spines). (SC. F. 4.1)
2. The students will identify some ways in which animals and plants are adapted to living in
different environments. (SC. F. 4.1)
3. The students will explain how animal and plants can be associated with their environment by
an examination of their structural characteristics of plants or animals. (SC. F. 4.1)
4. The students will compare and describe the structural characteristics of plants and animals.
(SC. F. 4.1)
Unit 4 Life Cycles 13 Days
Essential Question: How do plants and animals grow?
Learning Targets
1. The students will explain ways organisms change as they grow and mature. (SC.F.4.3)
2. The students will illustrate how living things grow and change in different ways and in
different lengths of time. (SC.F.4.3)
3. The students will explain that plants and animals are similar but not identical to their parents.
(SC.F.4.3)
Unit 5 Food Chains 13 Days
Essential Question: How do organisms get and use the matter/energy they need to live and
grow?
Learning Targets
1. The students will explain that plants produce oxygen and food for animals. (SC. F. 4.1)
2. The students will categorize animals according to what they eat. (SC. F. 4.1)
3. The students will show how living things are a part of a food chain. (SC. F. 4.1)
4. The students will recite the basic needs of living things. (SC. F. 4.1)
5. The students will explain that plants and animals are dependent upon each other for survival.
(SC.F.4.1)
Unit 6 Land, Water, and Air 13 days
Essential Question: What is the natural resources people use in their daily lives?
Learning Targets
1. The students will distinguish between natural and manufactured materials.
(SC.E.4.8)
2. The students will identify natural resources that people use. (SC.E.4.8)
3. The students will identify how natural resources are used to make manufactured
goods. (SC.E.4.8)
Unit 7 Weather 13 days
Essential Question: What are the four seasons?
Learning Targets
1. The students will show what makes up weather and how it changes from day to day.
(SC.E.4.6)
2. The students will demonstrate how to use simple tools to measure weather conditions
from day to day and across seasons. (SC.E.4.6)
3. The students will demonstrate how to use their senses, tools, and instruments to
obtain information from his or her surroundings. (SC.E.4.6)
4. The students will describe weather by the form and amount of precipitation.
(SC.E.4.6)
5. The students will explain how weather affects plants and animals. (SC.E.4.6)
6. The students will explain how the characteristics of some animals change as seasonal
conditions change.(SC.E.4.5)
7. The students will recognize patterns in weather. SC.E.4.5)
Unit 8 Observing Matter 13 days
Essential Question: How do we use simple instruments or tools to help us collect data?
Learning Targets
1. The students will explain that objects are composed of parts that are too small to be seen
without magnification. (SC.D.4.5)
2. The students will show that objects can be grouped according to their physical characteristics.
(SC.D.4.5)
3. The students will explain the effects of heating and cooling on solids, liquids, and gases.
(SC.D.4.5)
4. The students will describe how certain things change in some ways and stay the same in
others. (SC.D.4.5)
5. The students will explain the physical properties of ice, water, and steam. (SC.D.4.5)
6. The students will recognize systems of matter and energy. (SC.D.4.5)
Unit 9 Movement and Sound 13 days
Essential Question: What happens to an object at rest or in motion?
Learning Targets
1. The students will describe various ways gravity affects the motion of objects. (SC.D.4.6)
2. The students will explain how various things move at different speeds when different forces
are applied. (SC.D.4.6)
3. The students will observe and describe how things move in many different ways, such as
straight, zigzag, around and around, and back and forth. (SC.D.4.6)
4. The students will describe the position of an object by locating it relative to another object or
the background. (SC.D.4.6)
5. The students will explain the effects some objects have on others even when the two objects
might not touch. (SC.D.4.6)
6. The students will demonstrate that magnetism is a force that may attract or repel certain
materials. (SC.D.4.6)
7. The students will explain how the vibrations of objects cause sound. (SC.D.4.6)
8. The students will describe sounds from common sources. (SC.D.4.6)
Unit 10 Learning about Energy 13 days
Essential Question: What are systems of energy and how do they work?
Learning Targets
1. The students will explain that heat can be produced in many ways.(SC.D.4.7)
2. The students will explain that heat from the sun has varying effects depending on the
surface it strikes. (SC.D.4.7)
3. The students will explain that the sun supplies heat and light energy to Earth.
(SC.D.4.7)
4. The student will explain that light can pass through some objects and not others.
(SC.D.4.7)
5. The students will predict which materials will allow light to pass through and watch
ones that will not.(SC.D.4.7)
6. The students will recognize systems of matter and energy.(SC.D.4.7)
7. The students will explain that people need food for energy.(SC.D.4.7)
8. The students will explain that the nutritional value of various foods.(SC.D.4.7)