Science topics · Grades 1–6
Earth Science Lessons & Worksheets
Explore weather, water, rocks, and the forces that shape Earth. Browse science lessons and student activities organized by grade.
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Classroom idea: What clues tell us how Earth changes?
Bring in a rock, a weather record, a map, or a photograph of a landscape. Ask students to describe the evidence before making a claim.
Help students compare observations over time and distinguish a pattern from a single event.
Grade 2 · Earth Science
Grade 2 lessons
Explore weather, Earth materials, and changes to land.
Earth Materials
Soil Properties: Which Material Holds Water Best?
Compare prepared sand, silt-rich soil, and clay-rich soil with equal water tests to describe how different earth materials let water pass through or remain in the sample.
Changing Earth
Fast & Slow Changes to Earth
Use several sources to compare Earth events that happen quickly with processes that change the surface slowly over time.
Weather Patterns
Weather & Seasons: Patterns We Can Observe
Read simple weather graphs and compare seasons to find patterns in temperature, clouds, rain, snow, and wind while remembering that daily weather can still vary.
Changing Earth
How Water and Wind Change the Land
Observe how water and wind move loose land material, then compare solution designs under matched test conditions.
Earth's Surface
Landforms & Bodies of Water
Use pictures, simple maps, and models to identify landforms and bodies of water, show where features are located, and distinguish liquid water from solid ice.
Water on Earth
Water on Earth: Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, Ponds & Ice
Use pictures, labels, captions, and short text to identify water locations and states.
Grade 3 · Earth Science
Grade 3 lessons
Use weather and Earth-history clues to identify patterns.
Earth's Past
Fossils & Past Environments
Organize fossil data, find distribution patterns, and use evidence to infer broad features of past environments.
Weather & Climate
Weather vs. Climate: Finding Patterns in Data
Read tables, pictographs, and bar graphs to find seasonal weather patterns. Then use long-term information to compare climates in two regions.
Weather Hazards
Severe Weather: Design a Wind-Safe Shelter
Engineer a classroom shelter roof that resists strong model wind; test two designs fairly, compare data, and improve a solution.
Grade 4 · Earth Science
Grade 4 lessons
Investigate landforms, hazards, and Earth's surface.
Natural Resources and Energy
Renewable Energy: Choosing Sources for a School
Compare sunlight, wind and fossil fuel energy sources using local conditions, reliability, land needs and environmental effects; defend a school-energy decision with evidence.
Earth's Surface
Mapping Earth's Features: Mountains, Volcanoes & Earthquakes
Analyze maps of mountains, volcanoes, earthquakes, and ocean trenches to describe where Earth's features form clusters, lines, and overlapping spatial patterns.
Changing Earth's Surface
Weathering, Erosion, and Deposition
See how rock breaks down, sediment moves, and material settles. Use measurements from a water-erosion model to explain how Earth's surface changes.
Earth's History
Rock Layers, Fossils & Past Landscapes
Use relative time and fossil patterns to explain how a landscape changed from earlier land to later water.
Earth Processes & Hazards
Volcanoes, Earthquakes & Reducing Hazard Impacts
Compare multiple solutions that can reduce earthquake and volcanic-eruption impacts.
Grade 5 · Earth Science
Grade 5 lessons
Study water, resources, and connected Earth systems.
Earth's Water Systems
How Water Moves Underground: Infiltration, Permeability & Aquifers
Model how water infiltrates Earth materials, compare permeability, and explain how groundwater can collect and move through aquifers.
Earth Systems
Earth's Systems Working Together
Classify Earth components and build focused models of interactions between two systems.
Earth's Water
Where Is Earth's Water?
Use a rounded 100-part model and scaled graphs to describe how Earth's water and freshwater are distributed among major reservoirs.
Earth and Human Activity
Protecting Earth’s Resources: Community Science Solutions
Obtain and combine prepared source information to explain and monitor community resource solutions.
Grade 6 · Earth Science
Grade 6 lessons
Explain Earth processes and changes using models and evidence.
Water in Earth's Systems
The Water Cycle: Driven by Sunlight and Gravity
Build and revise a multi-pathway model of water moving among ocean, land, living things, and atmosphere; distinguish solar-powered phase changes from gravity-driven flows.
Weather & Climate
Weather Forecasting: Air Masses, Pressure & Fronts
Collect and interpret weather data to explain how moving air masses and fronts change local conditions and support probabilistic forecasts.
Weather & Climate
Ocean Currents: How Oceans Shape Regional Climate
Use long-term coastal climate evidence and ocean-circulation models to explain how ocean currents can redistribute thermal energy—and why currents are not the sole cause of climate.
Dynamic Earth
Plate Tectonics: A Changing Earth
Use maps and models to connect plate motion with earthquakes, volcanoes, mountain building, and pathways through the rock cycle.