Science Assessment

Students are expected to know that:

1. Sunlight directly warms the air, water, land, and other matter making up the surface of the earth (with nothing intervening).
2. Although air is warmed to some extent directly by energy from the sun, it is warmed mostly by the transfer of energy from the earth’s surface, which also is warmed by the sun. The more energy that is transferred to the surface of the earth by sunlight, the more energy is transferred from the surface of the earth to the air, and the warmer the surface of the earth and the air become. The less energy that is transferred to the surface of the earth (e.g., when clouds block the sunlight), the less energy is transferred to the air, and the less the surface of the earth and the air above it are warmed.
3. During any given day, from any place on earth’s surface, the sun appears to rise slowly upward above the horizon until the middle of the day (when the sun reaches its highest point in the sky during that day), and then appears to move downward toward the horizon. As the sun rises above the horizon and falls toward the horizon, it also moves horizontally to create an arc across the sky over the course of a day.
4. As the sun’s position in the sky above any given place on the surface of the earth changes, the angle at which sunlight strikes that place changes (“place” should be taken to mean a defined area). As the sun moves higher above the horizon, the size of the angle at which the sunlight hits the place increases, up to a maximum of 90° in some places where the sun is directly overhead. As the sun moves closer to the horizon, the size of the angle at which the sunlight hits the place decreases.
5. The angle at which sunlight strikes a place on the surface of the earth affects the amount of energy that is transferred from the sun to that place. The larger the angle becomes (i.e., the closer it is to 90°), the more energy is transferred to that place. The smaller the angle becomes, the less energy is transferred to that place.

Boundaries:

1. For this idea, students are not expected to know what energy is other than to know that when energy is transferred to a material it can make the material warm, that sunlight can transfer energy from the sun to the earth and make it warm, and that the earth can transfer the energy to the air and make it warm. They are not expected to know anything about the nature of electromagnetic radiation, how energy is transferred, or how energy warms matter.
2. For this idea, students are not expected to know that the amount of energy from the sun absorbed by the surface of the earth and transferred to the air above it depends on the nature of the material that is covering the surface of the earth at that place.
3. For this idea, students are not expected to know how the composition of the air, including amount of trace gasses and particles (solid and liquid) suspended in the air affect air temperature.