I’ve had a lot of experience teaching NC 7th grade science standards, and I have loved it! If you’ve followed my journey for any period of time, you know that “my thing” is science (plus math), and in particular, I have a lot of experience teaching 7th grade science in North Carolina. I taught 7th grade science for FIVE years before expanding my knowledge and leaving the classroom to obtain my Ph.D. in Science Education.
Throughout the time that I was in the classroom and beyond, I’ve had the opportunity to make many resources that directly align with 7th Grade NC Standards (and they fit with the new standards too), and I think it’s about time to write a blog post to share things with you in hope that it will help someone out.
When I started my journey as a teacher, the NC Standards didn’t exist, but luckily, they didn’t come too far after, so I’ve had all of this time to really understand them and understand what students struggled with the most.
So, here they are, here are 9 resources for 7th grade science teachers in NC!
7th Grade Science Standards NC Support Documents
I’m so thankful for the documents created for NC teachers. This support document for the 2023 science standards is awesome!
If you don’t have this bookmarked on your computer, go ahead and do that now! You can constant refer to this document to make sure you know exactly what you need to teach!
This document gives you the standards as well as what the standard means, what students should know, and what they should be able to do. There are clarification statements, boundary standards, information on the science and engineering practices, crosscutting concepts, disciplinary core ideas, and more!
In addition, this document gives you notes of what is not necessary for students to know! However, I do believe in rigor and holding your students to high standards, so I suggest teaching all that you can, but know what to focus on.
For example, in this document, it states that “Calculating speed is beyond the standard.” When teaching the about motion, you can practice calculating speed in order to support the standard, but make sure your students have the basics down first!
NC 7th Grade Science Released Test
Want to know another document to bookmark? You should bookmark the 7th Grade Science Released Final Exam. This is also another document that I would reference. The standards have been updated, but it is still nice to reference in relation to the content! I can’t wait to see what the state comes out with in regard to the new standards!
I like to begin with the end in mind. Do I think you should teach to a test? Absolutely not, but this is a great reference to see what knowledge your students should obtain.
Make learning fun and individualized, but just have the end goal in mind in the process.
These also make good warm-up questions!
NC 7th Grade Science Pretest
This is a resource (updated for the 2023 standards!) that I created after a few years of teaching with the standards. After experience looking at the documents, reviewing final exams, and determining students’ misconceptions, I created this as well as a end of year review.
Pretests are AWESOME!
First of all, you can determine what students may already know. In 7th grade, they are building upon skills, such as the water cycle and forms of energy, that they have already learned about in previous grades.
Second, it gives students a chance to “see what’s coming”. They may see topics that interests them and it gives them exposure to the content early on.
Students can keep these and compare it to their NC End of Year Review and the end of the year.
Science NC End of Year Review
This is a resource I created to help students review at the end of the year.
This is a great summary activity for ending the school year. Your students can see how much they have learned from the beginning of the year!
Interactive Lessons Aligned with Standards
This has become a passion of mine! I must say, starting out teaching, the HARDEST thing for me was finding materials and content that directly aligned to these standards. I consulted resources online, textbooks, colleagues, and more. There was just not a lot out there, so I decided to create resources myself!
The textbooks that I had in my school were SO out of date and did not align with the standards. I still remember that, in the layers of the atmosphere lesson, the textbook didn’t even include the exosphere! Videos did not do the trick. It took hours upon hours of researching to determine what exactly needed to be taught and what was appropriate for middle school. For middle school, you can can’t make the material too easy so that it is on the elementary level, but you also don’t want to make it too complex so that it is more on the high school and college level. It has to be JUST right.
So, I set out to create the interactive lessons. Along with many other reasons. They can be used for MULTIPLE purposes including for individual learning, science centers, distance learning, direct instruction, small groups/partners, ELL students, enrichment/tutoring, and more!
They are not only created with the “just right” content, but they also keep the 7 steps to help students retain information in mind. These strategies help students not only learn the content, but remember the content by reducing student cognitive load!
Each lesson created is based on my personal experience teaching the material, watching age-appropriate videos, standards documents, books, research-based instructional strategies, and many other resources. After doing a lot of research, I set out to create the lesson with rigor, standards-based content, fun, and so much more in mind!
These are completely aligned to NC Standards! If you are reading this and you are not from NC, they could be useful for you as well! North Carolina standards are based on the same framework used to create NGSS!
7th Grade Science Word Wall
I’m not going to lie, this is the FIRST resource I ever created to share with the world. I needed a word wall that directly aligned with NC 7th grade science standards. This resource was posted in my classroom for many years and has impacted my own students greatly and beyond. (It has been updated since!)
I LOVE WORD WALLS! They also have so many purposes.
Research shows that student word knowledge has a great impact on academic achievement. It was actually required at the school that I taught at to have a word wall. They didn’t need to be “fancy” with pictures and definitions, but I thought it was helpful.
Side Note I created a mini-word wall at home when my boys were younger, like 2-3. They learned how to spell words pretty early! Word walls work!
This word wall took a lot of blood, sweat, tears, and time, but it was worth it, and I hope someone finds it as helpful!
Science Quizlet Flashcards
This was also a LIFESAVER in my classroom. As mentioned, vocabulary is crucial so I wanted to make sure that my students had access to the vocabulary that we were learning at all times.
Quizlet is a flashcards website that allows students to study flashcards in a study mode or a game mode.
When I “spun” my classroom, an in-class flipped classroom, I had my students have “flashcard” time once they completed their lesson and were waiting on their classmates to finish. It was super helpful!
Here are the links to all of the flashcards I created for my 7th grade science classroom. This may save you a ton of time! Enjoy! They are a little older, but the terms are still relevant!
- Science Root Words, Prefixes, and Suffixes
- Scientific Inquiry
- Atmospheric Cycles
- Force and Motion
- Energy
- Structures and Functions of Living Organisms
- Evolution and Genetics
7th Grade Science Reference Sheets
I wanted to give my students a visual for all of the content in NC 7th grade science standards that they needed to know for the year, so I created a reference sheet for each strand including motion and stability – forces and interactions, energy, from molecules to organisms – structures and processes, heredity – inheritance and variation of traits, Earth’s systems, and Earth and human activity.
These can be used for review during the whole year, study guides for benchmarks and exams, and more. Students can keep these in their binders ALL YEAR LONG to review!
Science Writing Prompts for 7th Grade Science NC
Research shows that increasing scientific literacy aids in student achievement and so much more, so I set out to created a resource to help 7th grade science students do just that!
These science writing prompts are great for incorporating more writing in your science classroom. There are 66 total writing prompts, and there are 11 for each of the overarching strands for NC Standards: Motion and Stability – Forces and Interactions, Energy, From Molecules to Organisms – Structures and Processes, Heredity – Inheritance and Variation of Traits, Earth’s Systems, and Earth and Human Activity.
Why use writing prompts?
- Writing in the science classroom will increase your students’ scientific literacy.
- You will spark creativity in your students.
- You could address misconceptions.
- Writing on a regular basis could improve writing skills.
- Students will increase their science content knowledge.
- and more!
How can you use these writing prompts?
- Warm-ups
- “I’m Finished” Stations
- Science Centers
- Quiz/Test Questions
- Extra Credit
- Review
- and more!
Looking for resources that align with the new standards?
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