HS-ESS3-1NGSS*ScienceEarth and Space ScienceGrades 9-12
HS-ESS3-1: How Resources, Hazards and Climate Shape Human Activity
In plain English: HS-ESS3-1 is the NGSS high school performance expectation that asks students to construct an evidence-based explanation of how natural resources, natural hazards and changes in climate have influenced where and how people live. Students use data on fresh water, soils, minerals, floods, earthquakes, sea level and rainfall. It is usually taught in Earth and Space Science or Environmental Science.
Construct an explanation based on evidence for how the availability of natural resources, occurrence of natural hazards, and changes in climate have influenced human activity.
Clarification Statement: Examples of key natural resources include access to fresh water (such as rivers, lakes, and groundwater), regions of fertile soils such as river deltas, and high concentrations of minerals and fossil fuels. Examples of natural hazards can be from interior processes (such as volcanic eruptions and earthquakes), surface processes (such as tsunamis, mass wasting and soil erosion), and severe weather (such as hurricanes, floods, and droughts). Examples of the results of changes in climate that can affect populations or drive mass migrations include changes to sea level, regional patterns of temperature and precipitation, and the types of crops and livestock that can be raised.
Next Generation Science Standards · Disciplinary Core Idea: Earth and Human Activity · Official standard
Students construct explanations, based on evidence, for how three kinds of natural factors have shaped human activity: the availability of natural resources, the occurrence of natural hazards and changes in climate. They analyze invented data sets about settlements, farms, mines, floods and sea level, sort real historical cases, and test settlement choices in a sand-tray flood model. Every explanation follows the same structure: a claim, the evidence that supports it, and reasoning that links the two with Earth science ideas.
The NGSS Clarification Statement says: "Examples of key natural resources include access to fresh water (such as rivers, lakes, and groundwater), regions of fertile soils such as river deltas, and high concentrations of minerals and fossil fuels. Examples of natural hazards can be from interior processes (such as volcanic eruptions and earthquakes), surface processes (such as tsunamis, mass wasting and soil erosion), and severe weather (such as hurricanes, floods, and droughts). Examples of the results of changes in climate that can affect populations or drive mass migrations include changes to sea level, regional patterns of temperature and precipitation, and the types of crops and livestock that can be raised." HS-ESS3-1 has no official Assessment Boundary. All numbers on this page come from invented data sets, labeled as invented; the historical cases are described without statistics. Students also practice a key habit of explanation: natural factors influence human activity, but technology, economics and choices matter too, so a strong explanation weighs other causes.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Construct an explanation, with a claim, evidence and reasoning, for how the availability of a natural resource influenced where or how people live
Use data on natural hazards from interior processes, surface processes and severe weather to explain changes in settlement, building or land use
Explain how changes in sea level, regional temperature and precipitation, or the crops and livestock that can be raised have affected populations and migration
Compute percent changes and rates from tables and graphs and use them as evidence
Evaluate an explanation by weighing other possible causes, such as technology or economics
Prior Knowledge Required
Students should already be comfortable with:
How Earth's mineral, energy and groundwater resources are unevenly distributed MS-ESS3-1
Natural hazards and how data help forecast them and reduce their effects MS-ESS3-2
How the motions and interactions of air and water shape weather and climate MS-ESS2-6
Writing a claim supported by evidence and reasoning
Computing a percent change and reading tables and line graphs
Project a population-density map of your state or country. Give students two minutes to study it before the prompt.
Warm-Up Prompt
"Name two places on the map where many people live and two where few people live. What natural features might explain the difference? What evidence would you need before you could be sure?"
List ideas on the board in three columns without naming them yet: things people use (water, soil, ore), things that threaten people (floods, earthquakes), and long-term changes (drier, warmer, rising seas). At the end of the warm-up, label the columns: resources, hazards, climate. Point out any idea that is not natural (a highway, a university): the lesson returns to these as other possible causes.
Direct Instruction15-20 minutes
Building an explanation. An explanation in science answers "why" or "how" with three parts. The claim states the influence ("the town grew because of its copper deposits"). The evidence is data or observations (population counts, maps, yields, dates). The reasoning uses Earth science to link them (ore is concentrated in only a few places, so mining work is tied to that place). Use Diagram 1 to show the three kinds of natural influence and the band of human choices that can strengthen or weaken each one. The worked examples below use invented data.
Resource: fresh water and fertile delta soil
An invented survey of a river delta region lists 40 farming villages. 30 of them lie within 5 km of a river channel. Wheat on the delta silt averages 5.2 t/ha, and wheat on the rocky uplands averages 2.6 t/ha.
Result: 30 ÷ 40 = 75% of villages are near a channel, and the delta yield is 5.2 ÷ 2.6 = 2 times the upland yield. Claim: people settled where fresh water and fertile soil, renewed by river sediment, made farming more productive.
Resource: a high concentration of minerals
Copper Ridge (invented) had 1,200 residents in 1890. A copper mine opened in 1895, and by 1920 the town had 9,600 residents. The richest ore was used up by 1965, and the 1980 census counted 3,100 residents.
Result: 9,600 ÷ 1,200 = 8 times the 1890 population; from 1920 to 1980 the population fell by (9,600 - 3,100) ÷ 9,600 ≈ 68%. Claim: the concentrated ore drew workers, and its depletion pushed them out. The same pattern appears in towns built on coal or oil.
Hazard: a tsunami changes where people build
Before a tsunami struck Port Kessel (invented), 1,500 of its 2,500 homes stood less than 10 m above sea level. When the town rebuilt, a new rule allowed homes below 10 m only behind a seawall, and 375 of 2,500 homes remain in that zone.
Result: Before: 1,500 ÷ 2,500 = 60% of homes in the low zone; after: 375 ÷ 2,500 = 15%. The share fell by 75% of its old value. Claim: the hazard changed land-use rules and moved homes uphill.
Climate: sea level and a coastal community
A tide gauge on Tamaru Atoll (invented) shows sea level 21 cm higher in 2020 than in 1960. Days with high-tide flooding rose from about 3 per year in the 1960s to about 24 per year in the 2010s, and two village wells turned salty.
Result: 210 mm ÷ 60 years = 3.5 mm per year, and flooding days rose 24 ÷ 3 = 8 times. Claim: rising sea level spoiled fresh groundwater and pushed families toward higher ground on a larger island.
After each example, ask: "What is the claim? Which numbers are the evidence? What Earth science idea is the reasoning?" Then ask what else could explain the same data. For Copper Ridge, a drop in copper prices could also cut jobs; for Tamaru, land sinking could add to the local rise. A strong explanation names such alternatives and says what evidence would tell them apart.
Guided Practice15 minutes
Pairs analyze invented data for Sandridge County, a wheat-farming county on a dry plain (the pattern resembles the 1930s Dust Bowl on the southern Great Plains). Diagram 2 shows the rainfall and population columns.
Sandridge County (invented data), decade averages
Decade
Rainfall (cm per year)
Population (thousands)
Wheat harvested (thousand acres)
1910s
51
22.4
118
1920s
49
25.6
142
1930s
34
17.9
61
1940s
47
16.8
104
1950s
50
17.3
121
Compute the percent change in rainfall and in population from the 1920s to the 1930s. (Rainfall fell about 31% and population about 30%.)
Compute the percent change in wheat harvested over the same decades (a fall of about 57%). Why might the harvest fall faster than the rainfall? Consider wind erosion of plowed, dry soil.
Rainfall returned to 47 cm in the 1940s, but the population did not recover. Suggest two explanations, one natural and one human (for example, lost topsoil, or farm machines that needed fewer workers).
Write a claim, evidence and reasoning paragraph that explains how the change in regional precipitation influenced the county. Cite at least two numbers.
Independent Practice10-15 minutes
Each student analyzes invented data from Ash Hollow Valley, a farming valley on the flank of an active volcano. The upper and middle slopes have soils weathered from volcanic ash. In 1998 (invented), an eruption sent mudflows down two valleys.
Ash Hollow Valley (invented data)
Zone
Distance from summit (km)
Maize yield (t/ha)
Homes before 1998
Hazard rating
Upper slopes
0-5
4.4
150
High
Middle slopes
5-15
3.8
2,300
Moderate
Plain
15-30
2.2
3,400
Low
After the eruption, all 150 upper-slope homes were moved to the plain, but many families still farm their upper-slope fields by day. Students compute how many times the plain yield each slope zone produces, then write an explanation that uses both a resource and a hazard to account for where people now live and where they farm. They end with one question they would ask to test their explanation.
Closure5 minutes
Exit ticket: "Choose your own town or city. Name one natural resource, one natural hazard and one climate factor that influence life there today. For one of them, write a claim and name the evidence you would collect to support it." Collect the tickets and use them to open the next lesson with local examples.
Differentiation Strategies
For Struggling Students
Give a claim-evidence-reasoning frame: "The claim is ___. The data show ___ (number and unit). This supports the claim because ___."
Pre-label each data table with the kind of influence (resource, hazard or climate) before students analyze it
Let students compute one percent change with a worked template, then do the next one alone
For Advanced Students
Ask students to add a "competing explanation" paragraph to each explanation and name the evidence that would rule it in or out
Have students find a real public data set (a census table or a tide-gauge record) for their own region and describe what it would add to their exit-ticket explanation
Ask students to argue whether a levee or dam weakens or strengthens the influence of a hazard over many decades, using Homework Problem 3 as a starting point
Assessment Guidance
What to Look For
Check that every claim names a specific natural factor and a specific human activity, and that the evidence is data (a count, a rate, a percent change, a map pattern) rather than a restated claim. Look for reasoning that uses Earth science: why the resource is found in that place, how the hazard works, or how climate limits crops and water. Strong explanations mention at least one other possible cause and say why the evidence still supports the claim. Watch for students who treat a correlation between two trends as proof on its own.
02
Classroom Activities
3 Activities
1
Where Would You Build? A Sand-Tray Flood Model
25 minGroups of 3-4
Groups shape a river valley in a tray of damp sand, place ten "buildings", and then run a flood. They record which sites stay dry and how far each one is from the water, and use the results to explain why people have settled on floodplains despite the hazard.
Procedure
Pile damp play sand high at one end of the tray and carve a winding channel about 2 cm deep that runs to the low end. Smooth a flat floodplain about 4 cm wide on each side of the channel and a raised terrace beyond it.
Place ten wooden cubes as buildings wherever the group chooses. For each one, record its distance from the channel (cm) and whether it sits on the floodplain, the terrace or the hill.
"Flood" the valley: pour 1 L of water steadily into the top of the channel from the cup with holes, over about 30 seconds. Record every cube that gets wet or moves.
Safety: wear goggles while pouring so splashed sand cannot reach the eyes, keep the trays away from outlets and laptops, wipe up spilled water at once so nobody slips, and wash hands after handling sand.
Sample Results (invented)
One group placed 4 cubes on the floodplain (1-3 cm from the channel), 3 on the terrace (5-8 cm) and 3 on the hill (12-16 cm). The flood wet all 4 floodplain cubes and 1 terrace cube, and none on the hill. The group decided that fields belong on the floodplain, where water and new sediment arrive, and homes on the terrace.
Discussion Questions
In the sample results, half of the ten buildings got wet, and every floodplain building did. Why would real farmers still choose floodplain fields?
The hill sites stayed dry but are the farthest from water. Which resource do hill settlers give up, and what technology could replace it?
How is a sand tray different from a real valley? Name one thing the model leaves out (for example, how often floods happen).
Modification for Distance Learning
Students sketch a valley cross-section, mark ten sites and use the sample results above to explain their choices in a short recorded video or written post.
2
Evidence Card Sort: Real Places, Real Influences
20 minPairs
Pairs sort eight evidence cards about real places into resources, hazards and changes in climate. Some cards fit in more than one group. Each pair then chooses two cards and writes a full explanation for one of them.
The 8 Cards
Ancient Egyptian farming villages lined the Nile, where yearly floods left fertile silt in a desert region.
The Aswan High Dam, finished in 1970, ended the Nile's yearly flood downstream. It stores water for irrigation but traps the silt that once renewed the fields.
The California Gold Rush, which began in 1848, drew a large wave of migrants, and San Francisco grew quickly as a supply port.
Iceland sits on a volcanically active ridge. It heats many homes with geothermal energy, and in 2010 ash from the Eyjafjallajökull eruption halted much of Europe's air travel for days.
After the North Sea flood of 1953, the Netherlands built the Delta Works, a system of dams, sluices and storm-surge barriers.
After the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, several coastal towns moved homes to higher ground or raised the land before rebuilding.
During the 1930s Dust Bowl, drought and wind erosion of plowed prairie soil on the southern Great Plains drove many farm families to migrate west, many of them to California.
Norse settlers farmed in Greenland from about 985 until the 1400s. A cooling climate that shortened the season for hay and livestock is one of several explanations historians give for why the settlements ended.
Discussion Questions
Which cards describe people changing the land to reduce a hazard? Did the change create a new problem?
Card 8 names one of several explanations. What other kinds of causes might historians consider, and what evidence could help decide?
Which card shows one natural feature acting as both a resource and a hazard?
Challenge Variation
Each pair finds one more real case from their own state and writes a new card in the same style, then trades it with another pair to sort.
3
Shifting Crops: Climate and Farm Data
20 minGroups of 3
Groups graph invented data from the Maple Plains region and construct an explanation for why farmers changed what they grow. They must also consider causes that are not about climate.
Data (invented)
Year
Frost-free days
Corn (thousand acres)
Oats (thousand acres)
1975
142
40
88
1985
147
52
74
1995
153
66
61
2005
158
81
45
2015
165
97
30
Tasks
Graph frost-free days and each crop against the year. Compute the average change in frost-free days per year from 1975 to 2015.
Compute the percent change in corn acres and in oat acres from 1975 to 2015.
Corn needs a longer warm season than oats. Write a claim, evidence and reasoning explanation of the shift.
Discussion Questions
In this data set, corn acres rose in every decade and oat acres fell in every decade. Does a steady pattern like this prove that climate caused the shift?
Name two causes that are not about climate (for example, crop prices, new seed varieties or demand for animal feed) and the evidence that would test each one.
How could a longer frost-free season also change which livestock farmers raise?
Modification for Distance Learning
Share the table as a spreadsheet. Students build the graphs, post their explanation, and reply to one classmate with a competing cause.
03
Diagrams & Visual Aids
2 diagrams
Diagram 1: Three Natural Influences on Human Activity
The three kinds of natural influence named in HS-ESS3-1, with the examples from the Clarification Statement. Each arrow is a claim that needs evidence. The band at the bottom is a reminder that technology and choices can strengthen or weaken each influence.
Diagram 2: Sandridge County Rainfall and Population (Invented Data)
Invented decade averages for Sandridge County, drawn to scale. Rainfall (top, bars) fell from 49 cm to 34 cm in the drought decade, and the population (bottom, line) fell from 25.6 thousand to 17.9 thousand. Rainfall recovered in the 1940s but the population did not, so students must look for more than one cause.
04
Homework Assignment
~30 min
HS-ESS3-1 Homework: Explaining Human Activity with Evidence
Directions: All places and numbers below are invented for practice. Show each calculation with units. End every problem with a claim, the evidence you used and your reasoning, and name one other possible cause where the problem asks for it.
Part 1: Natural Resources (Problems 1-2)
In Dry Creek Basin, farms pump groundwater for irrigation. The water table was 18 m below the surface in 1980 and 42 m below it in 2020. Irrigated farmland fell from 64,000 acres in 2000 to 48,000 acres in 2020 as shallow wells went dry. (a) Find the average drop in the water table in meters per year. (b) Find the percent decrease in irrigated farmland from 2000 to 2020. (c) Explain how the availability of groundwater influenced farming in the basin.
Sheldon Flats had 2,000 residents in 2005. After drilling reached a large oil field, it had 6,500 residents in 2010. When oil prices fell, the town shrank to 4,200 residents by 2016. (a) Find the percent increase from 2005 to 2010. (b) Find the percent decrease from 2010 to 2016. (c) Which change is evidence that a fossil fuel resource influenced the town, and which change needs a non-geologic cause as well? Explain.
Part 2: Natural Hazards (Problems 3-4)
The river at Millbrook rose above flood stage 7 times in the 1950s and 6 times in the 1960s. A levee was finished in 1968. Floods above stage then reached the town 1 time in the 1970s, 2 times in the 1980s and 1 time in the 1990s. The number of homes on the floodplain grew from 800 in 1965 to 3,200 in 2000. (a) Find the average number of floods per decade before and after the levee. (b) By what factor did the number of floodplain homes grow? (c) Explain how the levee changed human activity, and why more homes on the floodplain could mean larger losses if the levee ever fails.
Two invented cities of similar size were shaken by earthquakes of the same strength. In City A, where a strict building code had been enforced for 30 years, 3% of buildings were badly damaged. In City B, which had no enforced code, 28% were badly damaged. (a) About how many times as large was the damaged share in City B? (b) Construct an explanation for why City B adopted a code after the earthquake, and name one piece of evidence that would show whether the code is working.
Part 3: Changes in Climate (Problems 5-6)
A glacier-fed river in the Kova Valley supplies irrigation water in late summer. Its average August flow fell from 120 m³/s in 1980 to 84 m³/s in 2020 as the glacier shrank. Over the same period, farmers replaced part of their rice fields with millet, which needs less water. (a) Find the percent decrease in August flow. (b) Explain how the change in climate influenced what farmers grow. (c) Predict one more change in human activity if the flow keeps falling.
Harbor City was founded in 1850 at a river mouth with a deep natural harbor and fertile river-bottom land. Since 1950, hurricanes have struck it 7 times in 70 years, and local sea level has risen 20 cm. In 2015 the city moved its main power station to higher ground. (a) Find the average number of years between hurricane strikes since 1950. (b) Write an explanation that uses all three kinds of natural influence to account for the city's founding and its recent decisions. (c) Which influence best explains the founding, and which best explains the 2015 decision? Justify both choices.
Rubric
Criterion
Full Credit (2 pts)
Partial Credit (1 pt)
Calculations
Rates, percent changes and factors correct, with units
Correct method with one arithmetic or unit error
Claim and Evidence
Claim names a specific natural factor and human activity; evidence cites the numbers
Claim is general or evidence is not tied to the data
Reasoning
Uses Earth science to link evidence to claim and weighs another possible cause where asked
Reasoning restates the claim or ignores other causes
05
Quiz: 20 Questions
Interactive, with answers
Instructions
All places and data in these questions are invented for practice. Your score updates as you answer, and Reset quiz clears everything so you or your students can try again.
Multiple choice: pick an option to check it. Short answer: write your answer, then reveal the model answer.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice
An invented survey of 50 towns in a dry region finds that 44 of them lie within 2 km of a river, a spring or a well field. Which explanation is best supported by this evidence?
Answer: A
44 ÷ 50 = 88% of the towns are near fresh water, and in a dry region water is the scarcest resource, so the claim links the resource to settlement. Choice B reverses the hazard: rivers flood, they do not protect. Choice C ignores that 88% is a strong pattern. Choice D reverses cause and effect.
Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In an invented region, the counties with coal deposits grew from 30,000 to 96,000 people between 1880 and 1920. By what percent did their population increase?
Answer: C
The increase is 96,000 - 30,000 = 66,000, and 66,000 ÷ 30,000 = 2.2, so the population rose by 220%. Choice B is the new population as a percent of the old (3.2 = 320%), not the increase. Choice A writes the raw increase in thousands as a percent. Choice D divides the old value by the new one.
Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Before a 1995 flood, an invented town had 420 homes in its 100-year floodplain. After a buyout program, 90 homes remain there. Which statement is supported by the data?
Answer: D
420 - 90 = 330 homes were bought out, and 330 ÷ 420 ≈ 79%. Moving homes changes exposure, not the hazard itself, so choice C is wrong. Choice A is the share that remains (90 ÷ 420 ≈ 21%). Choice B confuses a buyout with flood damage: the data say nothing about how many homes the flood destroyed.
Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice
An invented county landslide map shows that 23 of its 25 recorded landslides happened on slopes steeper than 30° that had been cleared of trees. Which land-use rule does this evidence best support?
Answer: B
23 ÷ 25 = 92% of the landslides happened on steep, cleared slopes, so a rule aimed at those slopes matches the evidence. Choice A targets river floods, which the map does not address. Choices C and D go far beyond what the evidence shows.
Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A tide gauge shows that sea level at an invented harbor rose 12 cm from 1980 to 2020. What is the average rate of rise?
Answer: B
12 cm = 120 mm, and 120 mm ÷ 40 years = 3.0 mm per year. Choice A divides 12 by 40 without converting centimeters to millimeters. Choice C divides by 4 decades instead of 40 years. Choice D uses the total change in centimeters as if it were a yearly rate in millimeters.
Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In an invented dairy region, the number of summer days above 32 °C rose from 8 to 21, and the number of dairy farms fell from 310 to 190. Which additional evidence would most strengthen the claim that the heat caused the decline?
Answer: A
The claim needs a mechanism tied to the same farms: if heat lowered milk output per cow, it would cut income and explain closures. Choice B does not connect heat to farming. Choices C and D are about demand or a different place and do not test the claim.
Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A student writes: "The town grew because of the mine." Which addition would turn this into an evidence-based explanation?
Answer: D
An explanation needs evidence (population counts and jobs) and reasoning (why the ore is concentrated in that place). Choices A and C add no evidence. Choice B shows a mine but not how it affected the town.
Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Over 30 years in an invented valley, rainfall fell by 25% and the farm population fell by 40%. During the same years, a new highway made jobs in a nearby city easy to reach. What is the best conclusion?
Answer: B
Two changes happened at once, so the data fit more than one cause. A strong explanation names the competing cause and the evidence that would separate them. Choice A ignores the highway, choice C ignores the rainfall, and choice D reverses cause and effect.
Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice
After an invented coastal county adopted a wind-resistant building code in 1990, a hurricane struck in 2018. 9% of homes built after 1990 were badly damaged, compared with 41% of older homes. How many times as likely was an older home to be badly damaged?
Answer: C
41 ÷ 9 ≈ 4.6, so older homes were about 4.6 times as likely to be badly damaged, which is evidence that the code reduced losses. Choice A subtracts the percents (41 - 9 = 32) and calls it a ratio. Choice B divides the other way (9 ÷ 41 ≈ 0.22). Choice D adds the percents.
Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which map pattern would be the best evidence that a mineral resource influenced settlement in an invented mountain region?
Answer: C
A cluster of towns along the ore belt, in terrain that otherwise attracts few people, links the resource to settlement. Choice A shows no link to any resource. Choice B points to a coastal factor instead. Choice D says nothing about minerals.
Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In an invented farming region, growing-season rainfall fell from 420 mm to 294 mm over two decades, and more families left the region. By what percent did the rainfall decrease?
Answer: A
The drop is 420 - 294 = 126 mm, and 126 ÷ 420 = 0.30, a 30% decrease. Choice B divides by the new value (126 ÷ 294 ≈ 43%). Choice C writes the drop in millimeters as a percent. Choice D is the remaining share, 294 ÷ 420 = 70%.
Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice
On an invented farm, a plowed slope loses about 12 t of topsoil per hectare each year, and a slope with contour grass strips loses about 1 t per hectare each year. How much more soil does 1 ha of the plowed slope lose over 20 years?
Answer: D
Over 20 years the plowed slope loses 12 × 20 = 240 t and the strip slope loses 1 × 20 = 20 t, so the difference is 220 t. Soil erosion is a surface-process hazard, and the numbers explain why farmers adopt contour strips. Choice A is the difference for one year only. Choice B is the plowed slope's loss without subtracting. Choice C adds the yearly rates.
Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In an invented coastal town, tsunami drills timed how long it took 90% of residents to reach high ground. Before new signs and evacuation routes, it took 38 minutes; after, it took 17 minutes. A tsunami from the nearest offshore fault would arrive about 25 minutes after the earthquake. What do the data show?
Answer: C
Before the changes, 90% of residents needed 38 minutes, longer than the 25 minutes before the wave arrives, so more than one resident in ten would still be on the way; after them, 90% are safe within 17 minutes. The drills measure the time for 90%, so they do not show whether most residents were caught before the changes, only that too many were. Choices A and B each ignore one of the two drill times. Choice D confuses reducing the harm of a hazard with changing the hazard itself.
Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Herders in an invented mountain range moved their summer grazing camps about 250 m higher as the average summer temperature rose by 1.5 °C. Air temperature falls about 6.5 °C for every 1,000 m of height. How much higher would a camp need to move to return to its old temperature?
Answer: D
1.5 ÷ 6.5 × 1,000 ≈ 230 m, so the observed move of about 250 m is consistent with herders following the temperatures their livestock need. Choice A multiplies 1.5 by 6.5 and then by 10. Choice B divides 6.5 by 1.5 and multiplies by 100. Choice C treats 1.5 °C as if each degree matched 1,000 m.
Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer
In an invented province, 70% of the people live on a river delta that covers 20% of the land. Rice on the delta averages 6.0 t/ha and rice on the hills averages 2.4 t/ha. How many times as crowded (people per unit area) is the delta as the rest of the province? Use this and the yields to explain the pattern.
The delta holds 70% of the people on 20% of the land, a density of 0.70 ÷ 0.20 = 3.5 times the provincial average. The rest holds 30% on 80%, a density of 0.375 times the average. So the delta is 3.5 ÷ 0.375 ≈ 9.3 times as crowded. The delta yields 6.0 ÷ 2.4 = 2.5 times as much rice per hectare, because river sediment builds deep, fertile soil and water is close by, so the land can feed far more people.
Question 16 of 20 · Short Answer
Over 40 years, an invented river rose above the ground floor of a town hospital in 6 of those years. What fraction of years is that, and how does this evidence support the decision to move the hospital out of the floodplain?
The hospital flooded in 6 ÷ 40 = 0.15, or 15% of years, about 3 years in every 20. Because floods return that often, a building that must stay open during emergencies faces repeated closures and damage. The flood record is the evidence, and the reasoning is that a hazard with a known frequency makes the risk predictable, so moving the hospital reduces the town's exposure.
Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer
The chloride level in a coastal village well rose from 150 mg/L to 900 mg/L while local sea level rose. Water with more than about 250 mg/L of chloride tastes salty (the US EPA guideline). By what factor did the chloride rise? Explain how this links a change in climate to human activity.
The chloride rose by a factor of 900 ÷ 150 = 6 and is now 3.6 times the 250 mg/L guideline. As sea level rises, salt water pushes into the coastal aquifer and mixes with fresh groundwater. The village loses a drinking-water source and must build a new well inland, treat the water, collect rain or move, so a change in climate has changed where and how people get water.
Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer
A student writes: "People live in river valleys because valleys are nice." Rewrite this as a claim, evidence and reasoning explanation. You may use invented evidence, but label it as invented.
A strong answer has three parts. Claim: people settle in river valleys because the valleys supply fresh water and fertile soil. Evidence (invented): in a survey of 60 villages, 48 lie within 3 km of a river, and valley-floor wheat yields are about twice upland yields. Reasoning: rivers carry water for drinking and irrigation, and floods spread sediment that renews the soil, so farms there feed more people. Full credit also notes the flood hazard as a cost.
Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer
On an invented floodplain, maize averages 4.8 t/ha, but a flood destroys the whole crop in about 1 year out of 8. On nearby uplands, maize averages 2.0 t/ha and never floods. Which land gives more maize per hectare on average over many years? Use the numbers to explain why people farm floodplains despite the hazard.
Over 8 years, the floodplain produces a crop in 7 of them: 4.8 × 7 ÷ 8 = 4.2 t/ha per year on average, more than twice the upland 2.0 t/ha. Even with lost years, the fertile floodplain soil produces more food, so the resource outweighs the hazard for fields. Many families still build homes on higher ground, because a flood can destroy a house as well as a crop.
Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer
After three drought years in an invented region, a survey asked 200 families who had moved away why they left: 124 named crop failure, 46 named jobs elsewhere and 30 named other reasons. What percent named crop failure? How strong is this as evidence that the drought drove migration?
124 ÷ 200 = 62% named crop failure. This is strong evidence because it asks the migrants directly and a clear majority name a drought-related cause. It is not complete: 23% named jobs elsewhere, and a survey of families who stayed would show whether crop failure was also common among them. Rainfall and harvest records for the same years would strengthen the link.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
06
Frequently Asked Questions
10 Questions
What does HS-ESS3-1 mean?
HS-ESS3-1 asks students to explain, using evidence, how natural resources, natural hazards and changes in climate have influenced human activity. Students do not just list examples: they make a claim, back it with data, and reason with Earth science. The code means High School, Earth and Space Science, core idea 3 (Earth and Human Activity), performance expectation 1.
Is HS-ESS3-1 taught in Earth science or environmental science?
It is usually taught in Earth and Space Science, and it also fits Environmental Science and the Earth science unit of an integrated course. It connects well with geography and history classes, which study the same places from a human point of view.
Does HS-ESS3-1 have an assessment boundary?
No. HS-ESS3-1 has no official Assessment Boundary, so teachers choose the scale and the cases. The Clarification Statement gives the examples to draw on: fresh water, fertile soils, minerals and fossil fuels; hazards from interior processes, surface processes and severe weather; and climate effects such as sea level, regional temperature and precipitation, and the crops and livestock that can be raised.
What counts as evidence in an HS-ESS3-1 explanation?
Evidence is data or observations: population counts over time, maps of where towns or landslides are, crop yields, flood records, tide-gauge readings or dated historical events. A strong explanation uses at least two pieces of evidence and says what each one shows. A restatement of the claim or a general statement ("rivers are useful") is not evidence.
Does HS-ESS3-1 mean that nature decides where people live?
No. The standard asks how natural factors have influenced human activity, not that they determine it. Technology, trade, laws and culture also shape choices, and technology can weaken a natural limit (irrigation in a desert) or add a new risk (building behind a levee). Good explanations weigh these other causes.
How do you teach claim, evidence and reasoning in Earth science?
Model one explanation aloud, labeling each part, then give students a data table and a sentence frame. Ask "Which numbers are the evidence?" and "What Earth science idea links them to the claim?" after every example. Remove the frame once students can write the three parts without it.
Can students do hands-on labs for this standard?
Yes. A sand-tray flood model like Activity 1 lets students test settlement choices, and a stream table works the same way. Use clean play sand, have students wear goggles while pouring water onto sand, keep water away from outlets, wipe up spills at once and have everyone wash their hands afterward.
Why use invented data instead of real data?
Invented data sets keep the numbers simple and the pattern clear while students learn to build an explanation. Once they can do that, real public data (census tables, tide-gauge records, stream-flow records) make excellent extensions. Always label which is which, as this page does.
How does HS-ESS3-1 connect to middle school standards?
It builds on MS-ESS3-1, where students explain why resources such as minerals and groundwater are unevenly distributed, and MS-ESS3-2, where they analyze hazard data to forecast events and reduce their effects. HS-ESS3-1 adds the human side: how those resources and hazards, and climate change, have shaped where and how people live.
What comes after HS-ESS3-1?
HS-ESS3-2 asks students to evaluate design solutions for energy and mineral resources using cost-benefit ratios, HS-ESS3-4 asks them to evaluate or refine a technology that reduces human impacts on natural systems, and HS-ESS3-5 uses climate data and models to forecast the rate of climate change. Each builds on the relationships students explain here.
07
Related Standards
6 standards
These standards connect to HS-ESS3-1: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.
Before this lesson
MS-ESS3-1Prerequisite
Explain how uneven distributions of Earth's resources result from geologic processes
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