Science, Grade 7

Unit 1: Interactions within Ecosystems

Indigenous knowledge of ecosystems, food webs and communities, biogeochemical cycles and energy flow, and how ecosystems change in response to natural and human influences.

• Indigenous knowledge of ecosystems

• Organizing life in ecosystems
• Producers, consumers, and decomposers
• Food chains and food webs

• Energy flow through ecosystems
• Carbon, nitrogen, and water cycles
• Photosynthesis and respiration

• Ecological succession
• Reducing human impact

Unit 2: Mixtures and Solutions

Distinguishing pure substances from mixtures using the particle model, separating the components of mixtures, and the properties and applications of solutions.

• Classifying matter
• The particle model of matter

• Methods of separation
• Separation in industry and agriculture
• Designing a separation device

• Solutes, solvents, and solubility
• Concentration of solutions
• Factors affecting solubility

Unit 3: Heat and Temperature

The impacts of heating and cooling technologies, states of matter and changes of state as evidence for particle theory, and the transfer of heat by conduction, convection, and radiation.

• Heating and cooling through history
• Insulation and prototypes

• States of matter and changes of state
• Heat versus temperature

• Conduction, convection, and radiation
• Controlling heat transfer

Unit 4: Earth's Crust and Resources

Catastrophic geological events and plate tectonics, locating and extracting Earth's geological resources, and the surface geology and soils of Saskatchewan.

• Plate tectonics and Earth's structure
• Catastrophic geological events

• Rocks, minerals, and Saskatchewan's resources
• Extracting resources and its impacts
• Careers in resource exploration

• The rock cycle and weathering
• Soils and land use