Two short sections on this 3-page 5th grade science worksheet connect the three states of matter to what their particles are doing, in line with NGSS 5-PS1-1. Students label pictures as a solid, liquid, or gas and add a sentence on how the particles behave. They then name the phase change in three everyday scenes, from a puddle drying up on a hot summer afternoon to lava cooling into rock, picking from a four-word bank.
5-PS1-1
“Develop a model to describe that matter is made of particles too small to be seen.”
Section 1, where each state's label comes with a sentence on its particles, and the puddle and soda-glass scenes in Section 2, where water moves as particles too small to see.
Students label each picture Solid, Liquid, or Gas and write one sentence on particle behavior. The expected answers describe particles that vibrate in place, slide past each other, or spread far apart and move freely.
Three scenarios get a term from the word bank of Melting, Freezing, Evaporation, and Condensation: a puddle that dries up, droplets on the outside of a cold glass of soda, and liquid lava that turns into solid rock.
Lesson opener
Hand out Section 1 before any particle diagrams go up. The sentences students write show you who already pictures particles and who still thinks of ice as one solid block.
Discussion prompt
Pause on the soda glass in question 2. Some students will say the glass is leaking, so ask where else the water could come from before you give them the word condensation.
Quick check
Section 2 has only three scenarios, so it fits the last five minutes of a phase-change lesson. The bank holds four terms, and Melting goes unused, so students cannot finish by elimination.
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