Science Curriculum

This support document includes the North Carolina Standard Course of Study goals and objectives along with objective weights, a detailed content explanation, a list of helpful resources and a collection of some suggested activities. A second section of this support packet is a collection of Inquiry Support Labs and Activities. The Inquiry Support Labs and Activities and the additional "Suggested Activities" included in the support document are in no way required but serve as guides and resources for classroom teachers.

The detailed content description should serve as minimum, not maximum, guidelines for all biology courses. This content description will also serve as a guide to developers of the N.C. Biology End-Of-Course Tests. A deliberate effort was made to reduce the required vocabulary in order that teachers could spend time developing conceptual understanding. Vocabulary and concepts listed as "deliberately excluded" may of course be taught at the teacher's discretion. These concepts may be more appropriate extensions and enrichment for an advanced or honors course.

Competency Goal 5 in the most recent revision of the standard course of study reads "students will develop an understanding of the behavior of organisms, resulting from a combination of heredity and environment." Examining the objectives in this goal, the Biology Committee believes the word behavior should be replaced with the phrase "adaptive responses." Adaptive responses is a more inclusive term, which includes plant tropisms, animal behaviors, and other adaptations such as mimicry, protective coloration and biological clocks.

Teachers should keep in mind that the strands are intended to permeate the content. Instructional emphasis should be on conceptual understanding, science as inquiry and providing students with opportunities to apply, analyze, and evaluate. The material should be taught and assessed in a manner that requires students to collect and analyze data. They should also make comparisons of concepts such as respiration and photosynthesis.

Goals and Objective Weights:

Weights have been specified as percentages for each goal and objective to guide teachers and local districts in their planning for the course. The NCDPI will use the objective weights when setting the content guidelines for Biology EOC tests.

History Strand:

The figures of historical significance that have been specified by this curriculum are listed within the support document with their respective areas of contribution. Collectively they represent 1% of the curriculum and represent the history strand as it applies to the biology curriculum. Students are expected to know the main contributions of each individual related to the objective he or she is listed with (some made major contributions to several areas of biology), have a sense of the context in which the scientist developed his or her ideas and the process these ideas went through to be accepted by the scientific community. They should be able to draw various conclusions about the nature of science as it pertains to the work of these scientists. Of course teachers are encouraged to include other scientists as appropriate.

Objective

Scientist

2.01

James Watson and Francis Crick

2.03

Gregor Mendel

2.03

Charles Drew

2.06

Charles Darwin

2.06

Louis Pasteur

3.02

Carolus Linnaeus

4.05

Rachel Carson

5.05

Jane Goodall

General Biology/Science Internet Resources

http://www.pbs.org/teachersource/sci_tech.htm

http://www.accessexcellence.org/RC/

http://www.discover.com

http://educate.si.edu/rb/rb_fs.html The Smithsonian

http://www.biology.arizona.edu/

http://www.enc.org/ - Eisenhower National Clearinhouse

http://www.educationplanet.com

http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/ (go to animations for diffusion video)

*Note:

The resource list included in this document is subject to change. Internet resources are often fleeting. Please be mindful of this situation. This portion of the document will occasionally be modified.

North Carolina Department of Public Instruction
301 N. Wilmington St.
Raleigh, NC 27601
Phone: 919-807-3300

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