Grade 7 · printable course

Life Science: Systems, Energy, and Change

Grade 7 · 434 pages · 73 lessons · PDF, print at home

A full-year life science course built around one storyline: life is organized into systems, at scale from cell to biosphere, that run on matter and energy and change over time. Students move from observing cells with household microscopy through body-system interactions, the photosynthesis/respiration energy story, ecosystem matter cycling, population dynamics, heredity, and natural selection. Investigations use household materials, free online datasets, and student-collected data. Aligned to NGSS Middle School Life Science and CCSS literacy in science and technical subjects.

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What is inside

Every unit and lesson in this book, in order. The same lessons are taught online at lettersanddevotion.com, so a family can move between paper and screen.

Life Science: Systems, Energy, and Change

73 lessons · try a lesson online free

Unit 1: Cells: The Unit of Life9 lessons
  1. 1.Cell theory (all organisms made of cells; cell is basic unit of life; cells come from pre-existing cells)
  2. 2.Prokaryotic vs. eukaryotic cell structure
  3. 3.Structure-function relationship in the mitochondrion
  4. 4.Organelle structure-function within a whole cell model
  5. 5.Unicellular vs. multicellular organization
  6. 6.The distinction between magnification and resolution in microscopy
  7. 7.Wet-mount slide preparation procedure
  8. 8.Use of observational evidence versus recalled fact in a CER argument about cell type
  9. 9.Inference of organelle presence from organism function
Unit 2: Body Systems as Interacting Subsystems10 lessons
  1. 10.Structure-function relationship in organ tissue (e.g., villi in small intestine, alveoli in lungs)
  2. 11.The cell-tissue-organ-organ system hierarchy
  3. 12.Nutrient transport across the digestive-circulatory system interface
  4. 13.Gas exchange between alveoli and capillaries
  5. 14.Cross-system causes of an unfamiliar symptom
  6. 15.Reflex (nervous) versus hormonal response timing and duration
  7. 16.Multi-system flow-model of digestion, gas exchange, and circulation for a single meal
  8. 17.Generalized principle that separating gas-carrying and nutrient-carrying pathways prevents harmful mixing
  9. 18.Claim-evidence structure of an informational text on organ systems
  10. 19.Validity of matter/energy transfer arrows in a systems flow-model
Unit 3: Photosynthesis and Respiration: The Energy Story10 lessons
  1. 20.The photosynthesis word equation (reactants and products)
  2. 21.The cellular respiration word equation (reactants and products)
  3. 22.The reverse-direction relationship between the photosynthesis and respiration equations
  4. 23.Photosynthesis and respiration as distinguishable processes in unfamiliar real-world scenarios
  5. 24.The path of a single carbon atom from ingested food through the body and out as exhaled CO2
  6. 25.Energy flow versus matter cycling in a living system
  7. 26.A prediction for CO2 indicator color change under light versus dark plant conditions
  8. 27.Graphed CO2 concentration data from a light-vs-dark plant investigation
  9. 28.Energy flow versus matter cycling, applied to an unfamiliar biological system
  10. 29.The global consequence of photosynthesis ceasing, reasoned from the photosynthesis and respiration equations
Unit 4: Ecosystems: Matter and Energy in Communities10 lessons
  1. 30.Trophic level classification within a food chain
  2. 31.Food web diagram construction from ecosystem description
  3. 32.The 10% energy transfer rule and its biological cause
  4. 33.Percentage transfer calculation from biomass data using proportional reasoning
  5. 34.The distinction between one-way energy flow and cyclic matter movement in ecosystems
  6. 35.Decomposer function as the mechanism completing matter cycling
  7. 36.Carrying capacity and limiting factors in a real population dataset
  8. 37.Indirect trophic effects of keystone species removal in an unfamiliar food web
  9. 38.The relationship between a textual claim and quantitative/graphical evidence about ecosystem disturbance
  10. 39.Synthesis of energy-pyramid construction, matter-cycling diagramming, and disturbance argument for a novel real ecosystem
Unit 5: Population Dynamics8 lessons
  1. 40.Carrying capacity and limiting factors as shown on a population graph
  2. 41.Density-dependent versus density-independent limiting factors
  3. 42.The mechanism linking resource availability, competition, and slowing growth rate near carrying capacity
  4. 43.Population-growth graphs constructed from tabular data
  5. 44.The lag pattern in predator-prey population cycles versus single-species logistic growth
  6. 45.Emergence of limiting factors in a novel, untaught ecosystem scenario
  7. 46.Claim-evidence-reasoning argument about a population's future trajectory
  8. 47.The claim that population crashes always indicate an external problem
Unit 6: Reproduction and Heredity9 lessons
  1. 48.Sexual vs. asexual reproduction and the variation each produces
  2. 49.Genes, alleles, and chromosomes as discrete units of inherited information
  3. 50.Dominant/recessive patterns and simple Punnett square prediction
  4. 51.Dominant/recessive patterns and simple Punnett square prediction
  5. 52.Genetic variation among offspring of the same parents
  6. 53.Probability prediction versus observed sample data in genetic crosses
  7. 54.Life cycles across species as patterns of reproduction and variation
  8. 55.Inferring dominance and genetic explanation from population-level trait ratio data
  9. 56.The relationship between genetic prediction, population data, and individual variation
Unit 7: Natural Selection and Adaptation8 lessons
  1. 57.Pre-existing heritable variation as the raw material for selection
  2. 58.Differential survival and reproduction as the mechanism of population-level trait change
  3. 59.Trait-frequency change calculated from population count data
  4. 60.Acclimation versus adaptation as distinct time scales and mechanisms
  5. 61.A full natural-selection argument built from an unfamiliar dataset
  6. 62.The intentionality misconception in natural selection explanations
  7. 63.Lines of evidence for natural selection and their respective limits
  8. 64.Generalizing the natural-selection argument structure to an invented system
Unit 8: Building the Evidence Case: Synthesis Across Scales9 lessons
  1. 65.Homologous structures as evidence of common ancestry
  2. 66.Convergence of multiple independent lines of evidence (multi-scale evidence argument)
  3. 67.Patterns of change, diversity, and extinction in the fossil record
  4. 68.The six evidence categories used to build a multi-scale argument
  5. 69.Common ancestry versus alternative explanations for shared traits
  6. 70.Convergence and contradiction among lines of evidence in a written argument
  7. 71.An original multi-scale evidence argument for a chosen species pair
  8. 72.Predictions of disconfirming or confirming multi-scale evidence for an unfamiliar species claim
  9. 73.Cumulative vocabulary from Units 1-7

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