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Grade 4. During the module's 15 lessons, students research energy transfer via electric current and electricity generation using different natural resources, to help them solve three engineering problems. This module includes a teacher guide, 10 student activity guides, 16 Smithsonian Science Stories student readers, and enough materials for 32 students to use 1 time.

Grade 4. Module Highlights: During the module's 15 lessons, students research energy transfer via electric current and electricity generation using different natural resources, to help them solve three engineering problems. This module includes a teacher guide, 10 student activity guides, 16 Smithsonian Science Stories student readers, and enough materials for 32 students to use 1 time.

Student Readers Available HERE

Alignment to the Next Generation Science Standards*
Performance Expectations

• 3-5-ETS1-1: Define a simple design problem reflecting a need or a want that includes specified criteria for success and constraints on materials, time, or cost.
• 3–5 ETS1-2: Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.
• 3–5 ETS1-3: Plan and carry out fair tests in which variables are controlled and failure points are considered to identify aspects of a model or prototype that can be improved.
• 4-PS3-2: Make observations to provide evidence that energy can be transferred from place to place by sound, light, heat, and electric currents.
• 4-PS3-4: Apply scientific ideas to design, test, and refine a device that converts energy from one form to another.
• 4-ESS3-1: Obtain and combine information to describe that energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and their uses affect the environment.

Disciplinary Core Ideas
ETS1.A: Defining and Delimiting Engineering Problems

• Possible solutions to a problem are limited by available materials and resources (constraints). The success of a designed solution is determined by considering the desired features of a solution (criteria). Different proposals for solutions can be compared on the basis of how well each one meets the specified criteria for success or how well each takes the constraints into account.

• Research on a problem should be carried out before beginning to design a solution. Testing a solution involves investigating how well it performs under a range of likely conditions.
• Tests are often designed to identify failure points or difficulties, which suggest the elements of the design that need to be improved.
• At whatever stage, communicating with peers about proposed solutions is an important part of the design process, and shared ideas can lead to improved designs.

• Different solutions need to be tested in order to determine which of them best solves the problem, given the criteria and the constraints.

• Energy can be moved from place to place by moving objects or through sound, light, or electric currents.

• Light also transfers energy from place to place.
• Energy can also be transferred from place to place by electric currents, which can then be used locally to produce motion, sound, heat, or light. The currents may have been produced to begin with by transforming the energy of motion into electrical energy.

• The expression "produce energy" typically refers to the conversion of stored energy into a desired form for practical use.

• Energy and fuels that humans use are derived from natural sources, and their use affects the environment in multiple ways. Some resources are renewable over time, and others are not.

Focal Science and Engineering Practices

• Defining problems
• Designing solutions

Focal Crosscutting Concepts

• Systems and system models
• Energy and matter

Phenomena and Problems Storyline
Lesson Summaries
Lesson 1: Camping Needs
Students brainstorm and record initial ideas about goals for a solution and initial ideas for a system that could solve the problem.
Lesson 2: A Flashlight System
Students research an existing portable light source: a flashlight. They create a model of a system that could make a flashlight light up.
Lesson 3: Light the Bulb
Students make observations of different battery-bulb-wire configurations to determine common characteristics of configurations that allow energy to flow through the components so a bulb lights up.
Lesson 4: Design a Switch
Students continue to define criteria for successful solutions. They draw diagrams of switches for the light part of their systems and participate in a peer review of switch designs.
Lesson 5: Switch Testing
Students build and test switch-controlled light circuits. They identify failure points in their designs or construction.
Lesson 6: Grammy's New Light
Students design, build, and test complete light systems that include a way to carry the systems. They test the devices under two likely conditions and compare their device with another team's solution. They discuss if one is better at solving the problem and why.
Lesson 7: Lights Out
Students record their initial ideas about electricity generation and what they could research in order to better understand the problem.
Lesson 8: Generate
Students research two ways that electricity can be generated by making observations of three systems and obtaining information from a text.
Lesson 9: Energy Resources
Students research natural resources that are commonly used to generate electricity.
Lesson 10: Environmental Impacts
Students use multiple texts to obtain more information about energy resources, focusing on the environmental impacts caused by accessing or using the different resources to generate electricity.
Lesson 11: The State of Our Electricity
Students research how electricity is currently generated in their state and whether there is potential for use of sunlight and wind as energy resources. They brainstorm solution ideas, incorporating what they have learned about energy resources, energy transfer, and the ways electricity is generated in the state.
Lesson 12: A New Energy Plan
Students design new energy plans for the state. Peers compare energy plans to determine how well the solutions meet the criteria and take into account the constraints, including limiting environmental impacts.
Lesson 13: I'm Here, Let Me In, Part 1
Students define criteria for success and record a solution idea that includes identifying how energy could be put into the doorbell system.
Science Challenge
Lesson 14: I'm Here, Let Me In, Part 2
Students design doorbell systems and peer review another team's solution proposal, evaluating against criteria and constraints.
Lesson 15: I'm Here, Let Me In, Part 3
Students build doorbell systems and test them for failure points using three different energy sources. They compare their results for the three energy inputs and determine which best solves the problem.

*Next Generation Science Standards® is a registered trademark of WestEd. Neither WestEd nor the lead states and partners that developed the Next Generation Science Standards were involved in the production of this product, and do not endorse it.