Indiana Science HS-AP1-1

ScienceGrades 9–12Levels of Organization in the Human Body

The Standard

Plan and conduct and investigation to provide evidence that feedback mechanisms maintain homeostasis in humans.

Indiana Academic Standards for Science (2023) · Levels of Organization in the Human Body

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students plan and run a safe test of how the body responds to a change. They measure pulse before light exercise, just after it, and during recovery, then use the pattern as evidence of feedback.
What Mastery Looks Like: Students keep exercise time the same, record pulse readings, and graph the results. They explain that pulse changes as oxygen demand changes, rather than staying at one fixed number. They can say that pulse data alone do not identify the feedback signal.
Common Misconceptions: Students may think homeostasis means every body measurement stays unchanged. They may treat a faster pulse as the problem the body is fixing, rather than a response to exercise. A pulse returning to its resting level does not, by itself, prove which feedback mechanism caused it.
How to Assess It: Give pairs a stopwatch and ask: "Plan and run a safe pulse test before, just after, and two minutes after 60 seconds of marching in place. Record your results and name one thing pulse data cannot tell you."

Lesson moves

Have pairs measure and graph pulse before and after one minute of marching in place, then during two minutes of rest.
Ask students to write why pulse rises during exercise even though the body works to keep internal conditions steady.
Give groups cards labeled rising body temperature, temperature sensing, sweating, and cooling; have them arrange the feedback sequence.
Show a smartwatch heart-rate graph from a walk and ask students to mark activity, recovery, and what the graph cannot prove.

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