Nebraska 8th Grade Science Standards

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SC K-12.1 Students will combine scientific processes and knowledge with scientific reasoning and critical thinking to ask questions about phenomena and propose explanations based on gathered evidence.

• 1 Abilities to do Scientific Inquiry
  • SC8.1.1 Students will design and conduct investigations that will lead to descriptions of relationships between evidence and explanations.
    • SC8.1.1.a Formulate testable questions that lead to predictions and scientific investigations
    • SC8.1.1.b Design and conduct logical and sequential investigations including repeated trials
    • SC8.1.1.c Determine controls and use dependent (responding) and independent (manipulated) variables
    • SC8.1.1.d Select and use equipment appropriate to the investigation, demonstrate correct techniques
    • SC8.1.1.e Make qualitative and quantitative observations
    • SC8.1.1.f Record and represent data appropriately and review for quality, accuracy, and relevancy
    • SC8.1.1.g Evaluate predictions, draw logical inferences based on observed patterns/relationships, and account for non-relevant information
    • SC8.1.1.h Share information, procedures, results, and conclusions with appropriate audiences
    • SC8.1.1.i Analyze and provide appropriate critique of scientific investigations
    • SC8.1.1.j Use appropriate mathematics in all aspects of scientific inquiry
• 2 Nature of Science
  • SC8.1.2 Students will apply the nature of science to their own investigations.
    • SC8.1.2.a Recognize science is an ongoing process and the scientific community accepts and uses explanations until they encounter new experimental evidence not matching existing explanations
    • SC8.1.2.b Describe how scientific discoveries influence and change society
    • SC8.1.2.c Recognize scientists from various cultures have made many contributions to explain the natural world
• 3 Technology
  • SC8.1.3 Students will solve a design problem which involves one or two science concepts.
    • SC8.1.3.a Identify problems for technical design
    • SC8.1.3.b Design a solution or product
    • SC8.1.3.c Implement the proposed design
    • SC8.1.3.d Evaluate completed technological designs or products
    • SC8.1.3.e Communicate the process of technical design
    • SC8.1.3.f Distinguish between scientific inquiry (asking questions about the natural world) and technological design (using science to solve practical problems)
    • SC8.1.3.g Describe how science and technology are reciprocal
    • SC8.1.3.h Recognize that solutions have intended and unintended consequences
    • SC8.1.3.i Compare and contrast the reporting of scientific knowledge and the reporting of technological knowledge

SC K-12.2 Students will integrate and communicate the information, concepts, principles, processes, theories, and models of the Physical Sciences to make connections with the natural and engineered world.

• 1 Matter
  • SC8.2.1 Students will identify and describe the particulate nature of matter including physical and chemical interactions.
    • SC8.2.1.a Compare and contrast elements, compounds, and mixtures
    • SC8.2.1.b Describe physical and chemical properties of matter
    • SC8.2.1.c Recognize most substances can exist as a solid, liquid, or gas depending on temperature
    • SC8.2.1.d Compare and contrast solids, liquids, and gases based on properties of these states of matter
    • SC8.2.1.e Distinguish between physical and chemical changes (phase changes, dissolving, burning, rusting)
    • SC8.2.1.f Recognize conservation of matter in physical and chemical changes
    • SC8.2.1.g Classify substances into similar groups based on physical properties
• 2 Force and Motion
  • SC8.2.2 Students will investigate and describe forces and motion.
    • SC8.2.2.a Describe motion of an object by its position and velocity
    • SC8.2.2.b Recognize an object that is not being subjected to a force will continue to move at a constant speed in a straight line or stay at rest (Newton’s 1st law)
    • SC8.2.2.c Compare the motion of objects related to the effects of balanced and unbalanced forces
    • SC8.2.2.d Recognize that everything on or around Earth is pulled towards Earth’s center by gravitational force
• 3 Energy
  • SC8.2.3 Students will identify and describe how energy systems and matter interact.
    • SC8.2.3.a Recognize that vibrations set up wave-like disturbances that spread away from the source (sound, seismic, water waves)
    • SC8.2.3.b Identify that waves move at different speeds in different materials
    • SC8.2.3.c Recognize that light interacts with matter by transmission (including refraction), absorption, or scattering (including reflection)
    • SC8.2.3.d Recognize that to see an object, light from the surface of the object must enter the eye; the color seen depends on the properties of the surface and the color of the available light sources
    • SC8.2.3.e Recognize that heat moves from warmer objects to cooler objects until both reach the same temperature
    • SC8.2.3.f Describe transfer of energy from electrical and magnetic sources to different energy forms (heat, light, sound, chemical)
    • SC8.2.3.g Recognize all energy is neither created nor destroyed

SC K-12.3 Students will integrate and communicate the information, concepts, principles, processes, theories, and models of the Life Sciences to make connections with the natural and engineered world.

• 1 Structure and Function of Living Systems
  • SC8.3.1 Students will investigate and describe the structure and function of living organisms.
    • SC8.3.1.a Recognize the levels of organization in living organisms (cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, organisms)
    • SC8.3.1.b Recognize that all organisms are composed of one or many cells; that these cells must grow, divide, and use energy; and that all cells function similarly
    • SC8.3.1.c Recognize specialized cells perform specialized functions in multicellular organisms
    • SC8.3.1.d Identify the organs and functions of the major systems of the human body and describe ways that these systems interact with each other
    • SC8.3.1.e Describe how plants and animals respond to environmental stimuli
• 2 Heredity
  • SC8.3.2 Students will investigate and describe the relationship between reproduction and heredity.
    • SC8.3.2.a Recognize that hereditary information is contained in genes within the chromosomes of each cell
    • SC8.3.2.b Compare and contrast sexual and asexual reproduction
• 3 Flow of Matter and Energy in Ecosystems
  • SC8.3.3 Students will describe populations and ecosystems.
    • SC8.3.3.a Diagram and explain the flow of energy through a simple food web
    • SC8.3.3.b Compare the roles of producers, consumers, and decomposers in an ecosystem
    • SC8.3.3.c Recognize that producers transform sunlight into chemical energy through photosynthesis
    • SC8.3.3.d Determine the biotic and abiotic factors that impact the number of organisms an ecosystem can support
    • SC8.3.3.e Recognize a population is all the individuals of a species at a given place and time
    • SC8.3.3.f Identify symbiotic relationships among organisms
    • SC8.3.3.g Identify positive and negative effects of natural and human activity on an ecosystem
• 4 Biodiversity
  • SC8.3.4 Students will identify characteristics of organisms that help them survive.
    • SC8.3.4.a Describe how an inherited characteristic enables an organism to improve its survival rate
    • SC8.3.4.b Recognize the extinction of a species is caused by the inability to adapt to an environmental change
    • SC8.3.4.c Use anatomical features of an organism to infer similarities among other organisms

SC K-12.4 Students will integrate and communicate the information, concepts, principles, processes, theories, and models of Earth and Space Sciences to make connections with the natural and engineered world.

• 1 Earth in Space
  • SC8.4.1 Students will investigate and describe Earth and the solar system.
    • SC8.4.1.a Describe the components of the solar system (the Sun, planets, moons, asteroids, comets)
    • SC8.4.1.b Describe the relationship between motion of objects in the solar system and the phenomena of day, year, eclipses, phases of the Moon and seasons
    • SC8.4.1.c Describe the effects of gravity on Earth (tides) and the effect of gravity on objects in the solar system
• 2 Earth Structures and Processes
  • SC8.4.2 Students will investigate and describe Earth’s structure, systems, and processes.
    • SC8.4.2.a Describe the layers of Earth (core, mantle, crust, atmosphere)
    • SC8.4.2.b Describe the physical composition of soil
    • SC8.4.2.c Describe the mixture of gases in Earth’s atmosphere and how the atmosphere’s properties change at different elevations
    • SC8.4.2.d Describe evidence of Earth’s magnetic field
    • SC8.4.2.e Compare and contrast constructive and destructive forces (deposition, erosion, weathering, plate motion causing uplift, volcanoes, earthquakes) that impact Earth’s surface
    • SC8.4.2.f Describe the rock cycle
    • SC8.4.2.g Describe the water cycle (evaporation, condensation, precipitation)
    • SC8.4.2.h Classify Earth materials as renewable or nonrenewable
• 3 Energy in Earth’s Systems
  • SC8.4.3 Students will investigate and describe energy in Earth’s systems.
    • SC8.4.3.a Describe how energy from the Sun influences the atmosphere and provides energy for plant growth
    • SC8.4.3.b Identify factors that influence daily and seasonal changes on Earth (tilt of the Earth, humidity, air pressure, air masses)
    • SC8.4.3.c Describe atmospheric movements that influence weather and climate (air masses, jet stream)
• 4 Earth’s History
  • SC8.4.4 Students will use evidence to draw conclusions about changes in Earth.
    • SC8.4.4.a Recognize that Earth processes we see today are similar to those that occurred in the past (uniformity of processes)
    • SC8.4.4.b Describe how environmental conditions have changed through use of the fossil record