6th grade Science: how to help at home
What your child learns in 6th grade science in the Oregon State Standards, and simple things to try at home.
Focus areas this year
- Energy, forces and motion
- Cells and living systems
- Weather, climate and the water cycle
Easy ways to practice science at home
- Turn everyday questions into investigations: “Which paper towel holds the most water?”
- Read a science news story together and ask what evidence it gives.
- Look up how a household machine works, such as a bike gear, a lamp or a fridge.
- Have your child draw and label a diagram of something they just learned.
What each unit covers
Body Systems
How the nervous and endocrine (hormone) systems send messages, how the excretory system removes waste, and the basic organs of the reproductive system, all at a simple organ-and-job level.
Cells: Life's Building Blocks
Practices evidence that living things are made of cells, the parts of plant and animal cells and their jobs, and how the cell works as a system.
Our Senses
Practices natural sensory systems: sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. It follows the Grade 6 science skill descriptors on natural and technical sensory systems in the New Brunswick curriculum.
Thermal Energy & Insulation
Practices how thermal energy moves from warmer to cooler objects, how mass and material affect temperature change, and how to design a device that slows heat transfer.
Work, Energy & Efficiency
Using the scientific terms force, displacement, work, energy and efficiency, calculating work as force times displacement, finding efficiency, and how friction and design affect the energy lost from machines.
Engineering Design
Practices the engineering design process: defining a problem with criteria and constraints, comparing solutions, testing to find the best features, and improving a design step by step.
Weather Systems
Practices how air masses and fronts change the weather, and how the sun and gravity drive the water cycle, including the rain shadow of the Cascades and atmospheric rivers.
Climate & Oregon's Changing Climate
Practices how unequal heating, Earth's rotation, ocean currents and mountains shape climate, the evidence that human activity is warming Earth, and ways to monitor and reduce human impacts, with Oregon examples like shrinking glaciers on Mount Hood, Cascade snowpack and the cool ocean off the coast.
Growing & Reproducing
Practices how animal behaviors and plant structures help living things reproduce, how genes and the environment both affect growth, and why asexual reproduction makes offspring with the same genes as the parent, with examples like Oregon's hazelnut orchards and salmon returning to spawn.
What the report card levels look like at home
- Beginning
- Just getting started with this idea. Short, regular practice with lots of support helps most.
- Approaching
- Understands parts of it and is building confidence. Keep practicing the tricky parts.
- Meeting
- Has it! Mixed review now and then keeps it strong.
- Exceeding
- Applies it confidently, even in new or harder situations. Try challenge mode and real-life problems.
Your child’s teacher decides the level on the report card. Read the Oregon report card guide.
Common questions
Turn everyday questions into investigations: “Which paper towel holds the most water?” Read a science news story together and ask what evidence it gives. Keep sessions short, about 10 to 15 minutes, and stop on a success.
The Oregon State Standards 6th grade science units include Body Systems, Cells: Life's Building Blocks, Our Senses, Thermal Energy & Insulation, Work, Energy & Efficiency, Engineering Design.
Free printable 6th grade science practice sheet
Questions from every unit, with an answer key.