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Science Grade 7 Unit: 2
Unit 2 CULMINATING PROJECT Pacing: 2 days
Unit 2: How do living things compare to each other?
Performance Assessment
Life on Earth
Teacher’s Notes
Students should begin working on the Life on Earth assessment at the end of Module 2.
Assessment. Students should work on the project with a partner during class time. Allow students about a week to complete the assessment. Time is allotted for presenting the skits during Module 3.
By completing the Life on Earth assessment, students will synthesize what they have learned about commonalities and diversity of living things, as well as how their characteristics are used to classify them. Life on Earth is set up using the RAFT strategy. For more information about RAFT, see
p. GPT-9 in Kaplan’s Educational Resources. It also provides an opportunity for students to write in a dialogue format and to practice working in groups and presentation skills. In addition, it provides students who learn best through auditory approaches to fully utilize their learning styles.
Have pairs of students write and present the skit, with one student taking the role of the scientific advisor and the other student taking the role of the extra-terrestrial life form. Have students use their notes, pp. 1–6 in their FOSS Diversity of Life Lab Notebooks, and their experiences from this unit to guide them in completing the task. For the purposes of this assessment, it may be helpful to designate a specified number of kingdoms for students to describe.
Any or all of the following adaptations may be used for students with special needs:
Review the class list of common characteristics of all living things from Module 1, the main idea organizer on the importance of diversity from Module 2, and taxonomy concepts from Module 3 when introducing the Unit Performance Assessment. Provide
Unit 2 CULMINATING PROJECT Pacing: 2 days
Unit 2: How do living things compare to each other?
Performance Assessment
Life on Earth
Teacher’s Notes
Students should begin working on the Life on Earth assessment at the end of Module 2.
Assessment. Students should work on the project with a partner during class time. Allow students about a week to complete the assessment. Time is allotted for presenting the skits during Module 3.
By completing the Life on Earth assessment, students will synthesize what they have learned about commonalities and diversity of living things, as well as how their characteristics are used to classify them. Life on Earth is set up using the RAFT strategy. For more information about RAFT, see
p. GPT-9 in Kaplan’s Educational Resources. It also provides an opportunity for students to write in a dialogue format and to practice working in groups and presentation skills. In addition, it provides students who learn best through auditory approaches to fully utilize their learning styles.
Have pairs of students write and present the skit, with one student taking the role of the scientific advisor and the other student taking the role of the extra-terrestrial life form. Have students use their notes, pp. 1–6 in their FOSS Diversity of Life Lab Notebooks, and their experiences from this unit to guide them in completing the task. For the purposes of this assessment, it may be helpful to designate a specified number of kingdoms for students to describe.
Any or all of the following adaptations may be used for students with special needs:
Review the class list of common characteristics of all living things from Module 1, the main idea organizer on the importance of diversity from Module 2, and taxonomy concepts from Module 3 when introducing the Unit Performance Assessment. Provide