What does a student learn in StateNorth Carolina,GradeGrade 7,SubjectScience?

Students learn how forces like pushes, pulls, and gravity change the way objects move. They also read and draw graphs that show how speed and direction shift over time.

Students describe where an object is, which way it is moving, and how fast, all measured against a chosen reference point, like a tree or a building.

Students use diagrams or physical models to show what happens when forces acting on an object cancel each other out versus when one force wins. The examples they work with include friction, gravity, and magnetism.

Students read position-vs-time graphs to describe how an object moved: how far it traveled, how fast, and whether it sped up, slowed down, or stopped.

Reading a distance-over-time graph, students identify whether an object is moving at a steady speed or speeding up and slowing down. A steeper line means faster movement; a flat line means the object has stopped.

Students learn how energy moves and changes in mechanical systems, like a swinging pendulum or a rolling ball. They explore why the total amount of energy stays the same even as it shifts between motion and stored forms.

Mechanical energy is the total of two things: how fast an object moves and where it sits (like a ball at the top of a ramp). Students explain how those two parts add up to describe an object's motion and position together.

Students trace how stored energy (a ball at the top of a ramp, a swinging pendulum) turns into moving energy and back again. They back up their explanation with evidence, not just a guess.

Students test what happens when objects push or pull each other, such as a ramp rolling a ball or a stretched rubber band launching an object, to show that energy moves from one thing to another whenever a force acts over a distance.

Students test ramps, pulleys, levers, and wheels to find out which simple machine makes a job easier, then use what they observe to explain which tool fits which task.

Living things need specific parts and processes to stay alive and have offspring. Students learn how those structures work together, from how a cell gets energy to how a whole organism grows, responds, and reproduces.

Single-celled organisms like Euglena and Amoeba survive without any help from other cells. Students explain how each tiny structure inside these organisms handles eating, moving, and reproducing on its own.

Students use diagrams or models to show what each part of a cell does, such as how the nucleus stores instructions or how the mitochondria produce energy, and explain how those parts keep plant, animal, and bacterial cells alive.

Students trace how a body is built in layers: cells group into tissues, tissues form organs, organs work together as systems, and systems keep the whole organism alive.

Students explain how the body's major systems work together to keep a person alive, covering how we digest food, breathe, circulate blood, and send signals through the nervous system.

Genes sit on chromosomes inside every cell and are passed from parents to offspring. Students explain how those inherited genes shape traits like eye color, height, or leaf shape, using evidence to back their reasoning.

Reproduction passes traits from parents to offspring, but the mix of genes can shift with each generation. Students learn why siblings can look different from each other and from their parents.

Students use diagrams or models to show why offspring from asexual reproduction are genetic copies of one parent, while offspring from sexual reproduction carry a mix of traits from two parents.

Students use a Punnett square to predict which traits an offspring might inherit from its parents, such as whether a trait like eye color will show up or stay hidden.

Students learn how the atmosphere works and why water moving through it as rain, evaporation, and clouds shapes daily weather and longer climate patterns.

Students compare the layers of air that wrap around Earth, looking at what gases make up each layer and how temperature and pressure change from the ground up into the upper atmosphere.

Students trace water as it moves through the sky, land, and ocean, showing how sunlight powers evaporation and gravity pulls water back down as rain or snow. Those same forces shape the weather patterns we see every day.

Students study weather maps to explain why storms, clear skies, or temperature changes arrive when they do. They connect moving air masses and pressure systems to the actual weather conditions those patterns produce.

Students read weather maps, satellite images, and radar to predict what weather is coming. They use cloud patterns, wind speed, temperature, and air pressure as clues.

Students use diagrams or models to show how rising warm air, global wind patterns, and the jet stream push weather systems around the planet, shaping both day-to-day conditions and longer seasonal patterns.

Students learn how human activity changes the air around us, and how changes in the atmosphere affect human health and daily life in return.

Students look at air quality data and use it to argue why keeping the atmosphere clean matters for human health. They learn that monitoring pollution and making responsible choices about it are connected.

Students look at real climate data to explain how gases like carbon dioxide trap heat in the atmosphere and push global temperatures up or down.

Students study how hazardous weather events and poor air quality harm people, then examine what communities do to reduce that harm. Covered conditions include wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and dangerous heat or UV levels.