What Are Being Reviewed on Fourth Grade Science (Science and Your Fourth Grader continued)
Fourth grade earth science usually ends with a review of the water cycle, showing how an understanding of this is needed to understand the weather, as well as the difference between weather and climate. Climate change and how it affects life on earth (connected to the endangered ecosystems in life science) and sources or forms of renewable energy are introduced. Children learn that there is energy deep in the earth, in the wind, water, and sun, and that coal or fossil fuels need not be used.
Finally, physical science reminds your child about the basic measurements they learned in the first and second grade and it teaches them how to measure using science lab instruments such as graduated cylinders, beakers, and scales. Basic conversions of measurements are also discussed since by now your child's math class has already taught them multiplication and long division. This is usually taught together with how to make basic graphs or plot data on a chart.
When it comes to energy in physical science, heat energy as a form of energy is reviewed. Sometimes electricity and magnetism is learned right after this because electricity is converted from and transforms to other forms of energy. But other times it is left for last because of how complex the topic can become. Methods of heat or thermal transfer such as convection, conduction, and radiation are taught, and this is usually followed by a lesson on light and its properties (translucent, transparent, and opaque.) Light is studied along with lenses, teaching your child how light refracts and how colors are created through reflection and transmission.
To wrap up the subject, the states of matter are also reviewed and the chemical and physical properties and changes are discussed. Along with these subjects, the forces of motion and friction, studying distance, displacement, speed and velocity are also included. This is usually when science word problems that have to be mathematically solved are first given to your child, and they may need your help in understanding how to take the problem apart and solve for what it is asking for.
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