Science
Lower School
The scientific method serves as the foundation of our science curriculum, intricately woven into the study of science, engineering, and technology. Through inquiry-based instructional practices, students are encouraged to generate questions that can be answered through investigation. By continually asking deeper questions about their observations and the information they gather during exploration, students expand their curiosity and re-evaluate their initial conceptions.
Teachers facilitate conceptual understanding of increasingly complex ideas through demonstrations, experiments, and challenges. Scientific understanding is connected to students’ interests and life experiences, engaging them and highlighting the relevance of scientific knowledge. By focusing on core concepts in science and engineering, students have the opportunity to explore each idea in greater depth, with understanding developing over multiple grades at increasing levels of sophistication.
Curricular themes and essential questions are designed to inspire budding scientists and engineers to ask questions, generate predictions, explore both individually and collaboratively, make observations, and conduct research. Hands-on experiments and labs provide opportunities for further investigation, while science fairs, expositions, and research projects encourage students to draw on their passions and become experts in their areas of interest. The program aims to instill skills in asking questions, obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information, planning and executing investigations, developing and using models, analyzing and interpreting data, engaging in argument from evidence, and constructing explanations and designing solutions.
Disciplinary ideas are organized into four domains:
- Physical Sciences
- Life Sciences
- Earth & Space Sciences
- Engineering & Design
Fundamental, all-encompassing standards include:
- Students ask questions and conduct investigations using appropriate tools and techniques to gather data.
- Students think critically and logically on the relationships between evidence and explanations.
- Students construct and analyze alternative explanations and communicate scientific arguments.
- Students understand the connection between and among the three main disciplines of science (Physical, Life, and Earth Sciences).
Middle School
The AVS Science Department has developed a sequence of courses based on the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), providing students with a solid foundation of scientific knowledge and refined skills in biology, earth science, and engineering. Our goal is for students to experience these scientific domains in a relevant and developmentally appropriate manner, encouraging them to make sense of phenomena and solve problems through scientific and engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas, and cross-cutting concepts.
Our courses are designed to scaffold important scientific skill sets while integrating interdisciplinary content in meaningful and authentic ways. We emphasize direct application, allowing students to test their thinking and make connections to real-world applications. This approach fosters critical thinking and prepares students for future scientific endeavors.
Courses include:
Practical Alchemy:
This class will serve as an introduction for interested students to principles of chemistry. We will start the year by examining the properties of matter and how early scientists, alchemists, and philosophers understood their world. Students will change matter in several ways and evaluate how things do or do not change their properties. We will then turn our attention to chemical interactions, exploring some of the basic chemicals present in our homes and lives, including in our kitchens. Finally, we will turn our attention to how chemists and chemical engineers can shape our lives today as students take on opportunities to demonstrate, explain, and design lab opportunities for their peers.
Astrobiology:
This course explores a profound scientific question: Are we alone in the universe? Astrobiology combines astronomy, biology, chemistry, geology, and planetary science to study the origins, evolution, and future of life in the cosmos. Students begin with the universe’s history—how stars and planets form and what light reveals about distant worlds. They'll examine habitability, the chemistry of life, and theories on life’s beginnings on Earth. Through evolution and deep time, students trace life’s adaptation to Earth’s changing environments and learn to recognize possible biosignatures. The course culminates in exploring how scientists search for life beyond Earth, inviting students to think critically about life on our planet and beyond.
Earth and Space Science:
This course focuses on introductory principles of Astronomy, the Theory of Plate Tectonics, and Earth’s systems and natural cycles. Students act as astronomers, geologists, and community advocates to examine the power of water, air, and rock in shaping our planet. Students will argue scientific claims by combining physical evidence with texts, media, and manipulation of data sets. Students will apply their understanding to make predictions and reasonable conclusions about Earth’s geological and biological future.
Engineering Everyday:
Use the power of the engineering design process to design structures, protect against disasters, unlock the energy of molecules and atoms, and fly beyond the sky. In this course, students will learn how to use science practices and the engineering design process to solve real-world problems. We will first examine how we can construct buildings and bridges to survive California's earthquakes. Then we will look at solutions for humanity's relentless thirst for more energy. Finally, we will turn to the skies and beyond by studying the history and future of aircraft and spacecraft design. The first steps in humanity's colonization of the solar system begin now.
