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PEI SOLS HS Fire: Forest Management

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The students will be introduced to a historical account of global climate change and the human events that may have impacted those changes. Fire has been used by humans throughout history to modify their environment, particularly forests, for human benefit. Over time, the management of forests has changed and the result is an increase in catastrophic wildfires. This storyline explores the use of fire as a forest management tool to improve the health of forests thereby decreasing the incidence of catastrophic fires and the role fire plays in climate change. 

Material Type: Unit of Study

Authors: Hattie Osborne, Pacific Education Institute

PEI SOLS HS: Food Waste

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Food waste is a major contributor to greenhouse gas. Wasted food and the resources to produce that food are responsible for approximately 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions. In this storyline, students learn about the resources required to produce food through following the carbon cycle and discover how food waste contributes to climate change. They will also learn the farm to table transport chain as well as how to conduct a food waste assessment. Finally, the students will research solutions to the problem of food waste and, as a final project, present one solution that they have thoroughly researched that can be applicable to their community. For CTE teachers, this storyline provides the basic knowledge needed to develop a deep understanding of WHY reducing food waste is an important solution to climate change. There are several potential extensions that Family Consumer Science teachers can utilize as well as Ag teachers and even Business teachers. There is a partial list at the end of the learning progressions. 

Material Type: Unit of Study

Authors: Hattie Osborne, Pacific Education Institute

PEI SOLS HS Forests: Carbon Sequestration

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The goal of the high school carbon sequestration in forests storyline is to build on the science of carbon sequestration from the middle school storyline. In this storyline, carbon sequestration refers to the removal of carbon (in the form of carbon dioxide) from the atmosphere through the process of photosynthesis. Carbon storage refers to the amount of carbon bound up in woody material above and below ground. High school students will develop an understanding of the variables and considerations that arise from managing forests for different purposes including carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services. 

Material Type: Unit of Study

Authors: Hattie Osborne, Pacific Education Institute

PEI SOLS High School Renewable Energy: Solar

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Solar energy in the form of light is available to organisms on Earth in abundance. Natural systems and other organisms have structures that function in ways to manage the interaction with and use of this energy. Using these natural examples, humans have (in the past) and continue to design and construct homes which manage solar energy in passive and active ways to reduce the need for energy from other sources. In this storyline, students will explore passive and active solar energy management through examples in the natural world. Students will use knowledge gained to design a building that maximizes the free and abundant energy gifts of the sun.

Material Type: Unit of Study

Author: Pacific Education Institute

PEI SOLS High School Coastal Hazards: Sea Level Rise

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As the climate is changing, one of the many consequences is sea level rise, which is not a standalone factor, but is closely related to erosion and extreme weather/storm conditions. The majority of coastal houses, recreational parks, and other coastal buildings were built as sturdy but stagnant structures that do not adjust well to the changing elements. Coastal homes have been collapsing into the ocean and restaurants have been destroyed by storm waves. The economic damage has been accumulating. In this storyline, students will explore the reasons behind sea level rise looking at thermal expansion, glacial ice melt, and sea ice melt. Students will examine real scenarios of coastal damage in Washington state and evaluate current city and tribal resilience plans. Finally, students will evaluate the constraints of existing challenges and propose strategies for solving these challenges.

Material Type: Unit of Study

Authors: Pacific Education Institute, Washington OSPI OER Project

PEI SOLS High School Food Waste (Spanish)

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El desperdicio de comida es uno de los principales contribuyentes a los gases de efecto invernadero. Los alimentos desperdiciados y los recursos para producirlos son responsables de aproximadamente el 8% de las emisiones mundiales de gases de efecto invernadero. En este caso, los estudiantes aprenden sobre los recursos necesarios para producir alimentos a través del ciclo del carbono y descubren cómo el desperdicio de alimentos contribuye al cambio climático. También aprenderán la cadena de transporte de la granja a la mesa y cómo llevar a cabo una evaluación de desperdicio de comida. Finalmente, los estudiantes investigarán soluciones al problema del desperdicio de comida y, como proyecto final, presentarán una solución que han investigado a fondo que puede ser aplicable a su comunidad. Para los maestros de CTE, este caso proporciona el conocimiento básico necesario para desarrollar una comprensión profunda de POR QUÉ reducir el desperdicio de comida es una solución importante para el cambio climático. Hay varias extensiones potenciales que los maestros de ciencias del consumo familiar pueden utilizar, así como los maestros de Agricultura e incluso los maestros de Negocios. Hay una lista parcial al final de las progresiones de aprendizaje.

Material Type: Unit of Study

Author: Pacific Education Institute

PEI SOLS High School Fire: Forest Management (Spanish)

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Se presentará a los estudiantes un relato histórico del cambio climático global y las acciones humanas que pueden haber afectado esos cambios. El fuego ha sido utilizado por los seres humanos a lo largo de la historia para modificar su entorno, en particular los bosques, en beneficio de los seres humanos. Con el tiempo, el manejo de los bosques ha cambiado y el resultado es un aumento de incendios forestales catastrófico. Este caso explora el uso del fuego como una herramienta de manejo forestal para mejorar la salud de los bosques, disminuyendo así la incidencia de incendios catastróficos y el papel que juega el fuego en el cambio climático.

Material Type: Unit of Study

Author: Pacific Education Institute

USDA BioPreferred Standards Context Lesson Plan

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Students will compare the basis of the derivatives for different plastics in order to determine their expected carbon-14 content. They will then compare ratios of carbon-14 to carbon-12 in plastic samples and categorize the sample according to its percent bio-based composition. Teacher Background Information: This lesson is more of a context design to be used with an existing nuclear chemistry lesson plan. The goal is for students to see the applicability of nuclear chemistry beyond carbon-dating by showing how carbon-dating can be used to determine the carbon sources of products.  Students will need a basic understanding of the carbon cycle, and nuclear equations. The lesson will need students to learn about half-lives halfway through the lesson and that is left open to teach as you wish. There is room for extension to mass spectrometry if you want to incorporate it here for AP Chemistry or as an honors extension. I would suggest using the Flinn POGIL on Mass Spectrometry.   

Material Type: Lesson

Authors: Carissa Haug, Johanna Brown, Saskia van Bergen

Science: Food Sovereignty and Environmental Sustainability

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Students will learn about the concept of food sovereignty and will explore features of the traditional food systems of Native Americans in Oregon and compare them to current food cultivation and consumption practices. Optionally, they can then research and prepare case studies of tribal and intertribal food sovereignty projects in Oregon and analyze the lessons those studies can provide for reducing the impact of human activities on natural systems.

Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan

Authors: Aujalee Moore, April Campbell

Science: Land Management and Partnerships

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The oral traditions of Native American tribes in Oregon tell the story of continuous existence ofIndigenous people on this land. From the coast to the inland valleys, the Columbia Plateau to theGreat Basin, tribal people have maintained continuous and balanced relationships with Oregon’snatural environment since time immemorial.This connection between Indigenous people and place has always informed their approach to whatis now called land management. Indigenous people had a thorough understanding of seasonal ecosystems and ecoregions, and this knowledge of soil, water, plants, and animals helped themsurvive. Contemporary Native people in Oregon continue to draw on traditional Indigenous knowledge, also known as traditional ecological knowledge, to guide how they manage the land.In this lesson, students will explore the components and processes of traditional ecological knowledge through the lens of contemporary tribal projects being conducted across the state. Students will consider how tribes are stewards of their lands and natural resources and how they leverage their resources by collaborating with nonprofit and government agencies.

Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan

Authors: Aujalee Moore, April Campbell

Science: Natural Resource Management: Historical and Contemporary

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This lesson examines tribal stewardship of natural resources and the concept of a federal trust relationship between tribes and the U.S. government. More than a century of federal policy denied tribes the rights to control and manage the lands that were set aside for them as part of treaty negotiations. These lands are legally owned by tribes and Native American individuals but are held in trust by the U.S. government. In recent decades, tribes have fought and won many legal battles to establish the right to manage the natural resources on tribal land, as well as the right to hunt, fish, and use those resources in accordance with their traditions. Today, tribal agencies frequently collaborate with both state and federal government agencies, such as the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Forest Service, to manage and protect the land.

Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan

Authors: Aujalee Moore, April Campbell

Seasonal Rounds & Ecosystems

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The annual cycle of seasonal rounds for Native Americans in Oregon reflects the relationship theyshare with the land—a relationship that includes intimate knowledge of local ecosystems. Since time immemorial, Tribes in Oregon have carefully considered seasonal ecosystems and ecoregions, and this knowledge of soil, water, plants, and animals helped them survive. Native Americans in Oregon today continue to draw on traditional Indigenous knowledge to guide how they manage the parts of their ancestral homelands that remain in their care.In this lesson, students will use a systems-thinking approach to explore the components andprocesses of ecosystems as they consider how the seasonal rounds of Native American Tribes in Oregon reflect local ecosystems. Students will analyze a hypothetical and a local ecosystem by identifying abiotic and biotic components and their relationships and then consider how Native people in Oregon considered the local abiotic and biotic components of their seasonal ecosystemsin seasonal rounds. Students will also consider the impact of forced relocation to reservations. Prior to white settlement, most Tribes in Oregon moved seasonally throughout a vast region in a pattern based on the availability of foods. Students will consider habitats, natural resources, stability and change, and living and nonliving components of habitats.

Material Type: Lesson, Lesson Plan

Authors: Aujalee Moore, April Campbell

Climate Action! How can we mitigate human impact on the atmosphere?

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Climate Action! is a freely available community research guide developed by the Smithsonian Science Education Center (SSEC) in partnership with the InterAcademy Partnership as part of the Smithsonian Science for Global Goals project. Smithsonian Science for Global Goals community research guides use the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a framework to focus on sustainable actions that are defined and implemented by students. Climate Action! is the new community research guide from the Smithsonian Science for Global Goals project for students aged 11 to 18. In the guide, young people explore the question “How can we mitigate human impact on the atmosphere?” The guide contains themes that lead youth to discover their interconnectedness with the atmosphere and understand complex climate systems. Together, these themes help prepare youth to take action towards a sustainable future for the planet. © 2024 Smithsonian Institution All rights reserved. First Edition 2024. Copyright Notice No part of this module, or derivative works of this module, may be used or reproduced for any purpose except fair use without permission in writing from the Smithsonian Science Education Center. Heidi Gibson, Smithsonian Science Education Center - Manager of the Global Sustainability Series, is the author. Jamie Rumage is the Oregon Open Learning - Science Group Administrator, not an official author or contributor of the published materials of the Smithsonian Science Education Center.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Heidi Gibson, Jamie Rumage, Smithsonian Science Education Center

iHub Biology Course

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The inquiryHub (iHub) biology curriculum is a full-year high school biology course anchored in phenomena and aligned to the Next Generation Science Standards. Denver Public Schools teachers, working with a team of researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder and Northwestern University, designed three units, which address all of the performance expectations in the NGSS for high school biology. Scientists are part of the team and have reviewed all content for accuracy. Achieve, Inc., which reviews science units, has reviewed the first unit in the curriculum and rated it as High Quality NGSS Design if Improved.

Material Type: Full Course

Authors: inquiryHub, Jamie Rumage

iHub Chemistry Course

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The inquiryHub (iHub) Chemistry curriculum is a full-year high school Chemistry course anchored in phenomena and aligned to the Next Generation Science Standards. Denver Public Schools teachers, working with a team of researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder and Northwestern University, designed five units, which address common high school physical science performance expectations in the NGSS for high school Chemistry. The units are organized around coherent storylines, in which students ask and investigate questions related to an anchoring phenomenon or design challenge. Students use science and engineering practices to figure out Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCI) and crosscutting concepts needed to make sense of and explain the phenomena or solve the problem presented in the challenge.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Author: inquiryHub

P.1 Energy Flow from Earth's Systems

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How can we design more reliable systems to meet our communities’ energy needs? This unit is designed to introduce students to the concept of energy transfer in a relevant and grounded context: the Texas power crisis of February 2021. Students read articles and wonder about the complex social, environmental, and physical realities that led to such a crisis. They figure out how energy transfers between systems from a generator to our communities, and what makes an energy source reliable. This allows the class to model and explain what happened in Texas at multiple scales, from the electrons in the wires to the power companies making difficult decisions to maintain stability. Students consider engineering tradeoffs, criteria, and constraints inherent in making decisions about our energy systems, and apply them in a culminating task: design a reliable energy solution that meets our communities' needs, as articulated by interviews with friends and family members. The task is designed to give students the tools to speak up in their local and global community for a better energy future, one that aligns with their own values, and those of their families.

Material Type: Activity/Lab

Authors: Jamie Rumage, OpenSciEd

Climate Science Concepts Fit Your Classroom: A Workbook for Teachers

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This Workbook is designed to be used by college faculty and secondary school science teachers. To teach our students and also to share this knowledge with the public and be credible, science teachers at all levels must acquire a good grasp of the science of climate change and must also develop skills for affecting attitudes in and out of the classroom.

Material Type: Full Course

Authors: Bassam Shakashiri, Jerry Bell, Wisconsin Initiative for Science Literacy

HS Biology - Designed to NGSS

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Through ongoing partnership with teachers across New York City, New Visions has developed this course map for a high school biology course fully designed to the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and the New York State Science Learning Standards (NYSSLS). Each unit follows a common structure: students engage with an anchor phenomenon and develop questions; go through sequences of learning and sense-making to develop and iterate on answers to those questions; then complete a three-dimensional performance task.

Material Type: Activity/Lab, Unit of Study

Authors: Jamie Rumage, New Visions School

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