South Dakota Science K-ESS2-2
The Standard
Engage in argument from evidence for how plants and animals (including humans) can change the environment to meet their needs. (SEP: 7; DCI: ESS2.E, ESS3.C; CCC: Systems)
South Dakota Science Standards (2024) · Earth’s Systems
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students notice ways plants, animals, and people change the places around them. They explain how a change helps meet a need and point to something they observed as evidence.
What Mastery Looks Like
- A student can point to roots spreading through soil, a beaver dam holding back water, or a person digging a garden bed. They can tell how the change helps the living thing and show what they noticed.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may describe where an animal lives without naming anything it changed. They may say roots take in water but miss that growing roots also move soil. Some guess why a change happened without pointing to evidence.
How to Assess It
- Show pictures of a stream before and after a beaver built a dam. Ask, "What changed, how does it help the beaver, and what do you see that tells you?"
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Set a clump of grass in a tray, expose the roots, and ask where growing roots moved soil to reach water.
Show a bird nest photo and ask, "What did the bird move, and how does its nest help its eggs?"
Give pairs cards showing roots, a beaver dam, and a shade tarp; have them match each change to water, safety, or shade.
Show a photo of a garden bed; ask students what soil people moved and how growing food helps them.
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Printable K-ESS2-2 Worksheet
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Related Standards
- MS-LS2-4
Construct an evidence-based argument that articulates how changes to physical or biological components of an ecosystem affect populations.
- 3-LS4-4
Make an evidence-based claim about the validity of a solution to a change in the environment that affects the types of plants and animals that live there.
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