This is the third in a series of posts relating to the physical science content standards for grades 5 through 8 of the 2005 National Science Education Standards from the National Research Council. We’ll look at how Real Science-4-Kids (RS4K) and Kogs-4-Kids (K4K) texts align with these.

National Science Education Standards; Physical Science 3:

TRANSFER OF ENERGY

1. Energy is a property of many substances and is associated with heat, light, electricity, mechanical motion, sound, nuclei, and the nature of a chemical. Energy is transferred in many ways.
2. Heat moves in predictable ways, flowing from warmer objects to cooler ones, until both reach the same temperature.
3. Light interacts with matter by transmission (including refraction), absorption, or scattering (including reflection). To see an object, light from that object--emitted by or scattered from it--must enter the eye.
4. Electrical circuits provide a means of transferring electrical energy when heat, light, sound, and chemical changes are produced.
5. In most chemical and nuclear reactions, energy is transferred into or out of a system. Heat, light, mechanical motion, or electricity might all be involved in such transfers.
6. The sun is a major source of energy for changes on the earth's surface. The sun loses energy by emitting light. A tiny fraction of that light reaches the earth, transferring energy from the sun to the earth. The sun's energy arrives as light with a range of wavelengths, consisting of visible light, infrared, and ultraviolet radiation.

Real Science-4-Kids meets this standard in the following ways:

The National Standards for “physical science” includes the subjects of chemistry and physics (“life science” or biology is addressed separately). Because each level of the RS4K curricula covers subjects in the same order (with more depth added for higher levels), the following alignments are generally true for Pre-Level I and Level II as well as Level I. However, specific examples are taken from Level I texts and workbooks since that age range most closely matches that of the National Standards presented here. Kogs workbooks match the subject matter of each chapter but expand that subject in the context of the book’s category (philosophy, critical thinking, history, etc.). Because information is built upon with each chapter, many types of knowledge in the standards show up in virtually all chapters. However, the key chapters for each section are shown below.

1. The Student Textbook for physics and the corresponding experiments in the Laboratory Workbook have numerous chapters specifically addressing the knowledge listed in section A above. They include: chapter 2 (Force, Energy and Work), chapter 3 (Potential and Kinetic Energy), chapter 4 (Motion), chapter 5 (Energy of Atoms and Molecules), chapter 6 (Electrical Energy and Charge), and chapter 9 (Light and Sound). In the Level I Chemistry Student Text, the energy in foods is addressed in chapter 8 (Energy Molecules).
2. The physics books address the knowledge listed in section B above with chapter 7 (Moving Electric Charges and Heat).
3. The physics books address the knowledge listed in section C above primarily in chapter 9 (Light and Sound). The related experiment instructs students on how to explore both reflection and refraction using a prism.
4. Electrical circuits are addressed in the physics texts in several ways and places. Primary discussions are in chapter 5 (Energy of Atoms and Molecules), chapter 6 (Electrical Energy and Charge), chapter 7 (Moving Electric Charges and Heat) and chapter 8 (Magnets and Electromagnets).
5. Chemical and nuclear reactions are discussed primarily in the physics books in chapter 5 (Energy of Atoms and Molecules). In the chemistry books, reactions are explained primarily in chapter 3 (Chemical Reactions) and chapter 8 (Energy Molecules).
6. The wavelengths of light are covered in detail in the physics books in chapter 9 (Light and Sound). The sun’s energy is also discussed at the end of chapter 10 (Conservation of Energy).