Crosscutting Concepts and Disciplinary
Core Ideas
February24, 2012
Heidi Schweingruber
Deputy Director, Board on Science Education, NRC/NAS
Goals of the Framework
• Coherent investigation of core ideas across
multiple years of school
• More seamless blending of practices with core
ideas and crosscutting concepts
Crosscutting Concepts
1.
Patterns
2.
Cause and effect
3.
Scale, proportion and quantity
4.
Systems and system models
5.
Energy and matter
6.
Structure and function
7.
Stability and change
Integrating Cross-cutting
• Taught in the context of instruction in the
disciplinary core ideas NOT in isolation
• Use common language to help students
recognize the concepts in different contexts
• Can help students see connections between
ideas in different disciplines
A core idea for K-12 science instruction is a
scientific idea that:
• Has broad importance across multiple science or
engineering disciplines or is a key organizing concept of a
single discipline
• Provides a key tool for understanding or investigating
more complex ideas and solving problems
• Relates to the interests and life experiences of students
or can be connected to societal or personal concerns that
require scientific or technical knowledge
• Is teachable and learnable over multiple grades at
increasing levels of depth and sophistication
Disciplinary Core Ideas:
Physical Sciences
• PS1 Matter and its interactions
How can one explain the structure, properties, and
interactions of matter?
• PS2 Motion and stability: Forces and interactions
How can one explain and predict interactions between
objects and within systems?
• PS3 Energy
How is energy transferred and conserved?
• PS4 Waves and their applications in technologies for
information transfer
How are waves used to transfer energy and information?
Disciplinary Core Ideas: Life Sciences
• LS1 From molecules to organisms: Structures and processes
How do organisms live, grow, respond to their environment, and
reproduce?
• LS2 Ecosystems: Interactions, energy, and dynamics
How and why do organisms interact with their environment, and what
are the effects of these interactions?
• LS3 Heredity: Inheritance and variation of traits
How are characteristics of one generation passed to the next? How
can individuals of the same species and even siblings have different
characteristics?
• LS4 Biological evolution: Unity and diversity
How can there by so many similarities among organisms yet so many
different kinds of plants, animals, and microorganisms? How does
Biodiversity affect humans?
Disciplinary Core Ideas:
Earth and Space Sciences
• ESS1 Earth’s place in the universe
What is the universe and what is Earth’s place in it?
• ESS2 Earth’s systems
How and why is Earth constantly changing?
• ESS3 Earth and human activity
How do Earth’s surface processes and human
activities affect each other?
Disciplinary Core Ideas:
Engineering, Technology and Applications of Science
• ETS1 Engineering design
How do engineering solve problems?
• ETS2 Links among engineering, technology,
science and society
How are engineering, technology, science, and society
interconnected?
Why Crosscutting Concepts
and Core Ideas?
The Power of Conceptual Knowledge
• Proficiency in science is more than knowing
facts. It is not a simple accumulation of
information.
• Factual knowledge must be placed in a
conceptual framework to be well understood.
• Students need to learn how ideas are related to
each other, and their implications and
applications in the discipline.
Prior Understandings
• Understanding is constructed on a foundation of
existing understanding and experiences.
• Prior understanding can support further learning
• Prior understanding can also lead to the
development of conceptions that act as barriers
to learning
Conceptual Change in Science
• Some kinds of conceptual change occur
naturally, some require intentional effort.
• For many ideas in science, students are unlikely
to arrive at an understanding of them without
explicit instruction (for example, understanding
atomic-molecular theory or genetics).
• Major changes in conceptual frameworks are
often difficult and are facilitated by instruction –
they take time!
Building Conceptual
Understanding
Learning Develops Over Time
• More expert knowledge is structured around conceptual
frameworks
– Guide how they solve problems, make observations, and
organized and structure new information
• Learning difficult ideas takes time and often come
together as students work on a task that forces them to
synthesize ideas
• Learning is facilitated when new and existing knowledge
is structured around the core ideas
• Developing understanding is dependent on instruction
Learning Progressions
• Sustained exploration of a core set of scientific ideas over
months and years.
• Core ideas should be central to a discipline of science,
accessible to students in kindergarten, and have potential
for sustained exploration across K-12.
• Findings from research about children’s learning and
development can be used to map these learning
progressions.
Grade-Band Endpoints
• Endpoints “sketch” how an idea can be
developed across K-12
• Defined for end of grades 2,5,8, and 12
• Provide a set of initial hypotheses about the
progression of learning – inform standards and
provide a basis for further research
Representation of a learning progression
Ideas build across the school
years to become successively
more sophisticated.
Responses to assessments
Item responses indicate
highest level of idea X
Highest level of
idea X
Low level of idea X
Increasing sophistication
Middle range level
idea X
Item responses indicate
higher level of idea X
Item responses indicate
medium level of idea X
Item responses indicate
lower level of idea X
Item responses indicate
lowest level of idea X
Progression for Core Idea: Structure of Matter
Highest level
Atomic Structure Model –
provides a mechanistic model for
chemical reaction.
By the end of 12th grade
By the end of 8th grade
Ideas build across the school
years to become successively
more sophisticated.
By the end of 5th /6th grade
By the end of 2nd grade
Lowest level
Atomic/Molecular Model –
explains properties and diversity
of materials
Particle Model – explains phase
changes and phases
Macroscopic Model – describes
matter
Progression for Core Idea: Organization for flow of
matter Highest
and energy
in organisms
level
By the end of 12th grade
By the end of 8th grade
By the end of 5th grade
By the end of 2nd grade
More detailed molecular model of
chemical reactions for matter and
energy in food
Chemical reactions model for matter and
energy in food, drawing on particle model
of matter and energy transfer model
Simple food model: food as matter and
energy
General needs model: Organisms get
what they need to survive from the
environment.
Lowest level
Implications for Revising Curriculum and Instruction?
Questions to discuss:
• For a component idea of your choosing, how
is the idea currently treated in curriculum and instruction?
• What changes are needed in order to shift to the vision in the
Framework?
• What crosscutting concepts can be integrated into instruction
related to this idea?
• What are the first steps you might take to facilitate this shift?
Report Out:
• Either the top 2 or 3 issues that emerge in your discussion OR
• The 1 or 2 first steps your group thinks are most important or
promising