Earth Science B — Water, Climate, Resources and Hazards (California)

Earth Science B — Water, Climate, Resources and Hazards is the second semester of a full-year laboratory Earth science course for grade 9 (UC A-G area D). It is built on the California NGSS high-school performance expectations in Earth’s systems (HS-ESS2), Earth and human activity (HS-ESS3) and engineering design (HS-ETS1), with the science and engineering practices, crosscutting concepts and RST.9-10 literacy standards throughout.

Four units: Earth’s Systems and California’s Water, Weather, Climate and the Energy Balance, Climate Change: Evidence and Models, and Resources, Hazards and Human Impacts. Each unit opens with a phenomenon California students can see or look up, includes a hands-on investigation lab with inexpensive materials, and closes with a written and presented performance task. The semester ends with an engineering design proposal that makes a California community more resilient.

Sources: Steven Earle, Physical Geology, 2nd ed. (BCcampus, CC BY 4.0) as the reference text; public-domain data from NOAA (Mauna Loa carbon dioxide, climate normals, the San Francisco tide gauge), NASA (GISTEMP), USGS and the California Department of Water Resources (CDEC); PhET simulations (CC BY 4.0), CODAP, NetLogo Web and spreadsheets as tools; SLS-written lessons, labs and tasks. Any number not from a named public source is labeled illustrative.

Labs and safety: every lab follows the Science Safety Handbook for California Public Schools. There are no open flames or hazardous chemicals, and every lab has an alternative route for a student who cannot do it in person. Climate change is taught as the settled science the CA NGSS requires, with respect for every student.