National Science Education Standards
From PBS Learning Media: https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/ess05.sci.ess.earthsys.caveintro/caves-and-karst/
Benchmarks for Science Literacy
4B/M8 (Grades: 6-8): Fresh water, limited in supply, is essential for some organisms and industrial processes. Water in rivers, lakes, and underground can be depleted or polluted, making it unavailable or unsuitable for life.
4C/E2 (Grades: 3-5): Rock is composed of different combinations of minerals. Smaller rocks come from the breakage and weathering of bedrock and larger rocks. Soil is made partly from weathered rock, partly from plant remains—and also contains many living organisms.
4C/H2 (Grades: 9-12): The formation, weathering, sedimentation, and reformation of rock constitute a continuing "rock cycle" in which the total amount of material stays the same as its forms change.
4C/M3 (Grades: 6-8): Sediments of sand and smaller particles (sometimes containing the remains of organisms) are gradually buried and are cemented together by dissolved minerals to form solid rock again.
4C/M4 (Grades: 6-8): Sedimentary rock buried deep enough may be re-formed by pressure and heat, perhaps melting and recrystallizing into different kinds of rock. These re-formed rock layers may be forced up again to become land surface and even mountains. Subsequently, this new rock too will erode. Rock bears evidence of the minerals, temperatures, and forces that created it.
4C/M6 (Grades: 6-8): Although weathered rock is the basic component of soil, the composition and texture of soil and its fertility and resistance to erosion are greatly influenced by plant roots and debris, bacteria, fungi, worms, insects, rodents, and other organisms.
4C/M8 (Grades: 6-8): There are a variety of different land forms on the earth's surface (such as coastlines, rivers, mountains, deltas, and canyons).
Next General Science Standards
Grade Level Disciplinary Core Ideas
4-ESS2.A.2 (Fourth Grade): Rainfall helps to shape the land and affects the types of living things found in a region. Water, ice, wind, living organisms, and gravity break rocks, soils, and sediments into smaller particles and move them around.
5-ESS2.A.1 (Fifth Grade): Earth’s major systems are the geosphere (solid and molten rock, soil, and sediments), the hydrosphere (water and ice), the atmosphere (air), and the biosphere (living things, including humans). These systems interact in multiple ways to affect Earth’s surface materials and processes. The ocean supports a variety of ecosystems and organisms, shapes landforms, and influences climate. Winds and clouds in the atmosphere interact with the landforms to determine patterns of weather.
5-ESS2.C.3 (Fifth Grade): Nearly all of Earth’s available water is in the ocean. Most fresh water is in glaciers or underground; only a tiny fraction is in streams, lakes, wetlands, and the atmosphere.
MS-ESS2.C.1 (Middle School Earth and Space Sciences): Water continually cycles among land, ocean, and atmosphere via transpiration, evaporation, condensation and crystallization, and precipitation, as well as downhill flows on land.