Curriculum Connections

In this scope, students will learn that living things need water, air, and resources from the land, and they live in places that have the things they need. Students will use models to represent the relationship between the needs of different plants or animals (including humans) and the places they live.

Explore 1: Activity - Home Sweet Home

In this activity, students choose one animal/plant, draw its habitat, and label how it is meeting its survival needs (food, shelter, water, and air for an animal or food, water, and air for a plant.

Explore 2: Activity - Build My Habitat

In this activity, students will build a terrarium for an insect in order to observe how different types of habitats meet the needs of plants and animals.

In this scope, students will learn how plants and animals (including humans) can change the environment to meet their needs.

Explore 1: Activity - Things Change

In this activity, students organize a set of picture cards to show how animals change their environment.

Explore 2: Engineering Solution - Beaver Dam

During this engineering solution, students will design a solution that will block a river to create a pond that will provide a place for a family of beavers to build a home.

In this scope, students will learn plants have different parts (roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits) that help them survive and grow. Students will use materials to design a solution to a human problem by mimicking how plants and/or animals use their external parts to help them survive, grow, and meet their needs.

Explore 1: Activity - Watch it Grow

In this activity, students observe various vegetables, seeds, and fruits and they identify and describe their different parts.

Explore 2: Activity - Humans Mimicking Plants

In this activity, students look at how inventors and engineers have studied helpful plant parts and figured out ways to help humans solve problems too.

Explore 3: Engineering Solution - Helpful Plants

During this engineering solution, students will use the scientific knowledge they gained about plant parts as well as 21st Century Skills of collaboration to design and construct an item that will help people.

In this scope, students will learn how plants use their external parts to help them survive, grow, and meet all of their needs.

Explore 1: Scientific Investigation - Growing Sideways

In this investigation, students observe how a plant grows toward the Sun.

Explore 2: Scientific Investigation - Growing Spuds

In this investigation, students will explore how potato sprouts behave in a warm, moist environment versus a cold, dry environment.

In this scope, students learn different types of matter exist and many of them can be either solid or liquid, depending on temperature. Matter can be described and classified by its observable properties.

Explore 1: Activity - Melting Snowman

Students explore changing states of matter by adding and taking away heat.

Explore 2: Activity - Mystery Balloons

Students explore unknown objects and substances inside balloons in order to list their physical properties and determine their state of matter.

In this scope, students will learn that different properties are suited for different purposes.

Explore 1: Inquiry Investigation - Soak It In!

In this investigation, students observe the strength and absorbency of two different types of paper towels.

Explore 2: Scientific Investigation - The Great Shoe Slide

In this investigation, students discover the best type of shoes for walking on a smooth floor.

Explore 3: Engineering Solution - Build a Monster

During this engineering solution, students will use the scientific knowledge of physical properties as well as the 21st Century Skill of collaboration to design and construct a toy that fits the toy company's criteria.

Explore 1: Scientific Investigation - Heat it Up!

In this investigation, students discover the effect heat has on different materials.

Explore 2: Make a Mini Water Cycle - NOT in STEMscopes

In this engineering solution, students will earn that water is always changing from a liquid to a gas and back again as it is heated and cooled. This process is called the water cycle.

Unit 4: Economy and Government of Missouri is an approximately two week unit where students learn about Missouri's branches of government, laws, symbols, and constitution. Students also learn about different types of businesses in Missouri, how taxes work, and how people in Missouri use banks.

Unit 3: Earth and Space Science is about six weeks long and contains two scopes, Weather and Climate and Processes and Impact of Natural Hazards.

In Topic 1: Weather and Climate, students focus on the question: How can we make predictions about the weather? Students will gather weather data and represent it in tables and graphical displays to describe typical weather conditions expected during a particular season.

Explore 1: Activity: Conditions in US Cities Students graph average precipitation and average seasonal temperature data from cities located in the United States given a set of color coded maps. Then students compare and contrast conditions for cities located in different regions around the United States.

Explore 2: Activity: Weather or Climate? (OPTIONAL) In this activity, students will investigate to find information to help them differentiate between weather and climate.

Explore 3: Research-Meteorologist for a Week! Students will gather information from multiple sources to understand weather, climate, and the role and responsibilities of a meteorologist.

Explore 4: Tuva-Climate (OPTIONAL) Students will obtain information to describe the climate in Singapore and Washington.

In Topic 2: Processes and Impacts of Natural Hazards, students will determine the merit of a design solution that reduces the impacts of a weather-related hazard.

Explore 1: Activity-A Tale of Two Houses Students compare the effects of natural disasters on two different houses.

Explore 2: Engineering Solutions-Rising Expectations! Students will use the scientific knowledge they gained as well as the 21st Century Skill of collaboration to design and construct a way to effectively protect New Orleans from rising water.

The 3rd Monday of April (April 21, 2025) is Patriot's Day. DESE has a two-day lesson for fourth grade students that examines the question: How can a holiday help us remember historical events in our nation's past?

Topic 2 of Unit 3, Part 2, Physical Science uses the scope Wavelength and Amplitude, which focuses on the question, How do amplitude and wavelength affect the motion of objects? In this scope students develop a model of waves to describe patterns in terms of amplitude and wavelength and that waves can cause objects to move.

Explore 1: Activity: Wave Challenge Students will use a model to observe amplitude and wavelength.

Explore 2: Activity: Waves and Motion Students will investigate how wavelength and amplitude affect the motion of objects.

Explore 3: Engineering Solution: Waves in the Earth (OPTIONAL) Students will use the scientific knowledge they have gained as well as the 21st Century Skill of collaboration to design and construct a simple seismograph.

Topic 1 of Unit 4, Earth and Space Science, uses the scope Rock Patterns, which focuses on the question, If environments change so slowly, how can we know what they used to be like? In this scope students identify evidence from patterns in rock formations and fossils in rock layers to support an explanation for changes in a landscape over time.

Explore 1: Activity: Rock Layers In this activity, students will observe fossil evidence in layers of clay to see what kinds of events affect the layers of Earth.

Explore 2: Activity: Earthquake Students will observe how an earthquake causes changes in the pattern of rock formations.

Unit 4: The Changes in Economic, Political, and Social Rights of Individual Groups Over Time is a 4-week unit.

In this unit students will learn about the cultural impact and changing roles among Native Americans, Immigrants, African Americans, and women from 1800-2000. They will apply this knowledge to present day situations dealing with inequality and civil rights.

Topic 1 of Unit 4: Physical Science uses the scope Matter is Everywhere, which focuses on the question: How do we know matter exists, even if it cannot be seen? In this scope, students develop a model to describe that matter is made of particles too small to be seen

Explore 1: Activity: Where's the Sugar? Students dissolve sugar in water to learn that matter is still there, even though it cannot be seen.

Explore 2: Engineering Solutions: Contaminated Water Students will use the scientific knowledge they gained as well as the 21st Century Skill of collaboration to design a solution that will help them figure out which water sample has been contaminated.