Frequently asked questions

 
While we took great care in ensuring cohesiveness across units and grade levels, we also know that the ability level of your students changes from year to year. As a result, you need a program that provides adaptable and flexible pacing, and that empowers you to make instructional decisions in the moment.

As you evaluate how well Amplify Science California can accommodate your pacing needs, consider the following:

Progress Builds: Our Progress Builds describe the way in which students’ understanding of the central phenomenon should develop and deepen over the course of a unit. Each Progress Build defines several levels of understanding, with each level integrating and building upon the knowledge and skills from lower levels. Because these Progress Builds are directly tied to the program’s system of assessments, teachers are armed with the data they need to make informed decisions about when to move on, when to slow down, and when to revisit a concept and dive deeper.

Multiple at-bats: Rather than introducing a concept on Monday, testing for mastery on Friday, and knowing students will forget everything by the next Tuesday, we set out to help students build meaningful and lasting knowledge that they can retain and transfer over the course of the entire unit. We accomplish this by giving students multiple opportunities (a.k.a. “at-bats”) to encounter, explore, and experience a concept. Said another way, Amplify Science California is actually made up of a series of multi-modal “mini-lessons”. This intentional cyclical and iterative design mirrors the 5Es, allows teachers the flexibility to speed up or skip ahead once students have demonstrated mastery, and empowers students to learn concepts more deeply than any other program. 

Extension activities: When some students are ready to move on and others are not, our unit extension activities can be a big help. Found in the Lesson Brief section of both the digital and printed Teacher’s Guide, these activities ensure that advanced learners remain engaged and challenged while teachers help the rest of the class build the foundational knowledge they need to be successful later in the unit.

 
What’s important to remember is that more hands-on doesn’t necessarily mean better, at least according to the California NGSS. That’s because only two of the eight Science and Engineering Practices (SEPs) are directly related to hands-on learning. 

Just as scientists gather evidence from many types of sources, so do students in the Amplify Science California program. Like scientists, students gather evidence from physical models, digital models, texts, videos, photographs, maps, and data sets. By doing so, we provide students more opportunities than any other program to practice using all of the practices called out in the California NGSS Framework.

NGSS 8 Science Practices

1. Asking questions
2. Developing and using models
3. Planning and carrying out investigations
4. Analyzing and interpreting data
5. Using mathematics and computational thinking
6. Constructing explanations
7. Engaging in arguments from evidence
8. Obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information

While all of our units engage students in gathering evidence from a rich collection of sources, the reliance on different types of evidence (and evidence sources) varies according to unit. For instance, some units lend themselves to meaningful hands-on experiences, while in other units the phenomena students are investigating are too slow, too dangerous, or too big to be observed directly. In those units, students rely more heavily on other evidence sources such a physical models or simulations.

Unit types in grades K–5
In each K–5 grade, there is one unit that emphasizes investigation, one that emphasizes modeling, and one that emphasizes design. In addition, in grades 3–5, there is also one unit that emphasizes argumentation.

Unit types in grades 6–8
Each 6–8 grade features three types of units: Launch, Core, and Engineering Internships. Each year has one Launch unit, six Core units, and two Engineering Internships.

For teachers who wish to supplement the lessons with even more hands-on activities, optional “flextension” activities are included in many units.

As a blended curriculum, districts who adopt Amplify Science California are outfitted with a variety of print and digital resources as well as hands-on materials kits. To explore the specific components of the program, visit our What’s Included page.

As our customers will tell you, when you adopt Amplify Science California, you aren’t just buying a science curriculum, you’re joining a family. As such, along with materials, your adoption of Amplify Science California also includes care and support through a variety of staff and resources, including: customer support specialists, pedagogical support specialist, implementation specialists, professional learning specialists, educational partnership managers, and more.