The unit focuses on the question How can people help end pandemics? It is designed to teach students about the COVID-19 pandemic, transmission of the COVID-19 virus, and the impacts of the pandemic on communities. Over the course of the unit, students will study the COVID-19 pandemic in light of historical pandemics to build an understanding of the following key concepts:

• How the COVID-19 virus spreads from person to person and through communities,
• How strategies to reduce transmission of COVID-19 work,
• How the actions of individuals can help to end pandemics.

The unit also supports the development of two social emotional competencies: self awareness and social awareness.

The OpenSciEd Instructional Model uses a storyline approach– a logical sequence of lessons that are motivated by students’ questions that arise from students’ interactions with phenomena.

To help teachers and students advance through a unit storyline, the instructional model takes advantage of five routines—activities that play specific roles in advancing the storyline with structures to help students achieve the objectives of those activities. The routines typically follow a pattern as students kick off a unit of study, investigate different questions they have, put the pieces together from those investigations, and then problematize the next set of questions to investigate.

The student-facing videos are intended to be shown to students as part of the unit while the teacher preparation videos provide information to teachers regarding the set up of laboratory investigations and other features of the instructional materials.

How can we design more reliable systems to meet our communities’ energy needs? This unit is designed to introduce students to the concept of energy transfer in a relevant and grounded context: the Texas power crisis of February 2021. Students read articles and wonder about the complex social, environmental, and physical realities that led to such a crisis. They figure out how energy transfers between systems from a generator to our communities, and what makes an energy source reliable. This allows the class to model and explain what happened in Texas at multiple scales, from the electrons in the wires to the power companies making difficult decisions to maintain stability. Students consider engineering tradeoffs, criteria, and constraints inherent in making decisions about our energy systems, and apply them in a culminating task: design a reliable energy solution that meets our communities' needs, as articulated by interviews with friends and family members. The task is designed to give students the tools to speak up in their local and global community for a better energy future, one that aligns with their own values, and those of their families.

In partnership with teachers, the Louisiana Department of Education arranged OpenSciEd (grade 6-8 science) content in a manner that stays true to the vision of the materials and provides clear guidance on how to use them in a fully remote environment. The modified materials assume that teachers will have synchronous virtual meetings with students in addition to home learning.
The site also provides a variety of resources with options for students who do not have internet access.

In this document, we offer suggestions for developing and maintaining engagement agreements that promote safe student-driven learning experiences in remote learning environments. Remote learning environments might be synchronous experiences enhanced by technology that allows educators and learners to see and talk with each other, asynchronous communications that may or may not be aided by technology, or somewhere in between. When technology is used in remote learning, there will be variation in the skill and comfort level among teachers and students. Whatever approach you use for digital technology, be aware of your district and school policies in selecting tools to use.