Twelve lettered cards on this 3-page 5th grade sheet describe everyday heat, from a metal spoon in soup to a sea breeze. Students sort them into a three-column chart headed Conduction, Convection and Radiation. Page 2 adds two written questions about a metal slide beside a plastic one and about how the sun's energy reaches Earth. The answer key lists all twelve cards by letter, four to a column, and gives model answers to both questions.
4-PS3-2
“Make observations to provide evidence that energy can be transferred from place to place by sound, light, heat, and electric currents.”
The chart asks students to decide whether heat moves by touch, by moving fluid or across empty space in twelve examples, and question 3 applies that to sunlight.
Twelve cards labeled A to L, including an ice cube melting in your hand, ironing a shirt, a toaster browning bread and a hot air balloon rising.
A chart with three columns and eight lines each. Students write each card in the column for how the heat moves.
Question 2 asks why a metal slide feels hotter than a plastic one, next to a photo of both. Question 3 asks which kind of transfer brings the sun's energy to Earth and why the other two cannot work in outer space.
The twelve cards sorted by letter, plus written answers to questions 2 and 3.
Say what touches what
Before anyone writes, have students name what touches what on each card. The ice cube melting in your hand is conduction, and many students read it as cold moving into the hand instead of heat moving into the ice.
Toaster and heat lamp
Cards I and K are radiation, yet some students pick convection because the air nearby is warm. Ask whether anything has to move or touch for the heat to arrive.
Exit ticket
Use question 3 on its own at the end of a unit on the sun and Earth. A full answer names radiation and says why conduction and convection need matter.
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