Middle School Science: A ‘Special Version of Curiosity’

One day each winter, for the past three years, Colorado Academy Seventh Graders have arrived at the door of their Middle School Science classroom with nervous excitement, and sometimes stunned silence, to discover a preserved human cadaver arm neatly laid out on a sterile sheet on a lab table, an array of surgical tools and supplies arranged nearby.

 

The arm comes to school courtesy of CA parent and board-certified orthopedic hand, wrist, and elbow surgeon Dr. In Sok Yi, whose interactive exhibit—in which students marvel and squirm as they examine the muscles and tendons inside the arm, wrist, and hand, then make bone repairs using surgical screws—is always one of the marquee events of the Middle School Science Symposium, a major moment on the academic calendar since its inauguration in 2024.

Yi’s visit, and those of the dozens of other parent doctors, scientists, engineers, and innovators who participate in the event, is a prime example of what Middle School Science Instructor and Department Chair Kathleen Kirkman says is CA’s growing emphasis on real-world phenomena and systems-level concepts in science.

“Cross-cutting experiences like Dr. Yi’s,” says Kirkman—surely no pun intended—“allow our Middle School students to engage with data and experiments through authentic scenarios,” in this case combining fields such as anatomy, sports medicine, and bioengineering, “to envision themselves as professionals actually taking on scientific challenges that have real impact and relevance.”

 

So instead of just mastering science content, Kirkman goes on, students walk away from experiences like the Science Symposium able to make a connection between knowledge and its application in the world. 

As fellow Middle School Science Instructor Josh Reilly explains, “The science is a vehicle for going much deeper into the skills we’re really hoping our students develop.”

Skills development is the heart of CA’s Middle School Science curriculum, which largely aligns with that proposed in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), a multi-state effort to design a set of research-based, up-to-date K–12 science standards that give educators the flexibility to design learning experiences that stimulate students’ interests in science and prepare them for college, careers, and citizenship.

Within NGSS, there are three distinct and equally important dimensions to learning science: cross-cutting concepts, which make connections across scientific domains and help students gain a coherent and scientifically-informed view of the world; science and engineering practices, which explain and extend what is meant by “inquiry” in science and the range of cognitive, social, and physical skills that it requires; and core ideas, like the concept of systems in which multiple components—muscles and tendons, stars and solar systems—work together.

In essence, according to Kirkman, CA’s Sixth through Eighth Grade Science arc promotes “higher-order thinking and real-world problem-solving through evidence-based learning, fostering collaboration, innovation, and resilience to prepare students to be leaders and change-makers.”

Grade-level tentpoles

Every Middle School grade has its own “tentpole” Science experience like the Symposium, which is open to all.

In Sixth Grade, that big moment is the Land, Water, and Human Impacts project, a culmination in which students draw on months of investigations into how human activity, the water cycle, and geologic processes interact to change the planet. For the project, Sixth Graders must design a city site optimized to minimize human impact on land and water resources, developing a geologic report and a detailed plan for building, using, and maintaining a new school so that it doesn’t accelerate soil erosion, increase nutrient runoff, or reduce water quality.

 

“A lot of Sixth Grade focuses on what I’d call ‘societal’ science,” says Instructor Erin Galvin. “That means considering Earth’s resources and the choices we make as consumers—asking, ‘How do I show up responsibly when I know resources are limited and not distributed equitably across the planet?’”

As across all three grades, systems thinking is central here, notes Kirkman. 

“All year long, Sixth Graders dig into Earth’s systems—water, land, air—and look at how they interact with human systems such as cities and homes. Our students are constantly being prompted to wonder, ‘How do these different forces work together? How do the parts combine to perform some kind of function?’”

 

In Seventh Grade science, learners turn their attention to human systems: cell biology, brain functions, health and disease, and biomedical engineering. “We focus on humans as subjects of investigation,” according to Galvin, “with students developing an understanding of how we solve human problems and the impact of science on individuals and society.”

The centerpiece of the Seventh Grade experience is the Health Design Challenge, a unit that asks students to combine their knowledge of the human body, health, and disease to recommend treatment plans and potential engineered solutions for conditions such as diabetes and celiac disease.

“The goal is to combine accurate science with empathy,” Galvin relates, in order to help a fictional patient understand what is happening in their body, how it affects daily life, and treatment and management options. 

 

In teams, Seventh Graders each are assigned a role in the project: the disease specialist, who researches and builds expertise in a given condition; the medical professional or nutritionist, who focuses on diet, exercise, and lifestyle; the biotech engineer, who is tasked with designing or improving a treatment, device, or medication; and the clinical trial coordinator, who researches actual studies and creates an informed consent contract for participants.

According to Galvin, the Health Design Challenge adds critical depth to the study of body systems and biomedical engineering, encouraging students to explore how professionals in different fields help people achieve a better quality of life. “In the team model, it’s not just one individual abstractly researching an issue; there are defined, real-world roles that must work together to come up with a solution that’s focused on the patient.”

Eighth Graders move from the micro to the macro, expanding the scope of their systems knowledge to encompass topics such as the solar system, Newton’s Laws, physics, chemistry, and climate and computer science—all areas they’ll continue to study throughout high school.

In one lab-based unit, students investigate chemical properties by analyzing the reactions between metals and various de-icing compounds—a real-world case study aimed at formulating a recommendation for keeping CA’s winter walkways clear while protecting vehicles and equipment.

 

“The way we teach Eighth Grade science is very specific to our Middle School,” says Kirkman. “It’s not the traditional half year of physics, half year of chemistry, and you’re ready for high school. So much of what we spend our time on is about exposure to all the ways we impact the world, how we impact each other, and how science can play a role.”

The capstone to students’ final year as Middle School scientists is the Micro-Museum project, a systems science showcase inspired by the work of a nonprofit, MICRO, whose mission is to increase access to science education around the world. Students design an interactive, free-standing, scientifically accurate Micro-Museum gallery to engage children and adults on a unique topic related to one of the systems they have studied, such as space exploration or climate science.

 

The culmination is as much a display of skills as a deep-dive into a chosen science topic, explains Kirkman. 

“They use our library’s resources to do research; they author a digital brief which they make available online through a QR code; they design their physical exhibit with an interactive element. It draws on everything they’ve learned during their three years of Middle School Science.”

Portrait of a graduate

As the Micro-Museum project suggests, scientists “graduate” from CA’s Middle School program with deep experience in the critical skills they will need to succeed in high school and beyond: the ability to approach any challenge with intention, the experience to design investigations and consider sources of error, even the instinct to meet the latest science headlines on social media with the question, “Where’s the data to support that?”

Says Dance, “As someone who’s taught high school biology before, I’m not expecting next year’s Ninth Graders to remember every single cell organelle that we taught in Seventh Grade, for example.”

Adds Reilly, "But we've given them a toolbox: We do expect them to be able to design an experiment, to analyze data, to communicate their results effectively.”

 

Continues Dance, “The biggest skill we want them to take with them is the skill of being inquisitive, of being curious about the world around them, how they interact with it, and how they are making an impact. I don’t think any of our scientists haven’t gotten really good at asking questions.”

 

Asking questions about not only science and the world, Galvin notes, but wondering about their own future paths, too.

“For us, the focus from Sixth through Eighth Grade is getting our students to connect science with the real world. So in the Health Design Challenge or the Science Symposium, they’re getting a firsthand understanding of how this career uses science, how that medical role would need to communicate, how a researcher would collect and interpret data.”

From geologists to city planners, CA Middle Schoolers have already begun to picture what it might look like to pursue science as a career. And at the just-opened CSU Spur Campus, the Middle School science team has found an innovative space where Sixth and Seventh Graders can indeed see real science in action.

A field trip destination for CA Science students almost since opening day three years ago, CSU’s free facility for discovery and learning offers a behind-the-scenes look at careers ranging from biotech engineers and veterinarians to agriculturalists and entrepreneurs. Rotating programs connect students to potential futures through live demonstrations, hands-on experiments, and interactive experiences in food, water, and health.

“Spur is a great fit for CA,” says Galvin.

 

Yet science education, she makes clear, isn’t only preparation for careers in science. It is an essential component of modern literacy. 

Understanding how the Earth’s systems change in relation to human activity has never been more critical to the future of civilization. Knowledge of engineering and computing models is more essential than ever as AI seems poised to take over vast swaths of skilled professions. And being able to comprehend evidence and draw informed conclusions couldn’t be more important in a world in which pandemics, energy and resource scarcity, and political instability pose novel challenges and questions.

“We are instilling this special version of curiosity,” reiterates Dance, “that doesn’t stop with asking questions: It wants to know more, to figure out the deeper causes and effects, and then to think through a problem thoughtfully, creatively, and methodically.”

This, in other words, is how CA’s Middle School scientists will save the world.