Energy & Fossil Fuels Activities for 4th Grade Science

Introduce elementary students to natural resources and environmental impact with this engaging 5E lesson. Designed to support differentiated, student-led learning, this comprehensive unit aligns with NGSS 4-ESS3-1 and TEKS standards. Students explore key concepts through vocabulary activities, discussion prompts, and a hands-on station lab featuring interactive exercises, reading passages, and research tasks. They demonstrate understanding through categorization, writing, and drawing activities, with an extension station for early finishers. The lesson includes editable presentations, interactive notebooks, and bilingual note-taking templates to reinforce learning. Choice projects encourage deeper exploration, while STAAR 2.0-aligned assessments and review worksheets ensure comprehension. Ideal for both physical and virtual classrooms, this flexible resource makes learning about Earth's resources both accessible and engaging. The resources below will give students a comprehensive understanding of energy and fossil fuels. All of the following materials are also included in the Kesler Science Membership.

The Kesler Science Natural Resources and Environment 5E Lesson is a comprehensive Earth science unit designed for elementary students. It includes editable presentations, worksheets, choice projects, and assessments, all requiring minimal preparation. The lesson supports differentiated, student-led learning and aligns with NGSS 4-ESS3-1 and the 2021 TEKS standards for Texas teachers.

Following the 5E Model, the unit engages students with vocabulary cards, discussion prompts, and common misconceptions. The exploration phase features a student-led station lab with nine stations, offering hands-on activities, reading passages, research tasks, videos, and interactive exercises to accommodate different learning styles. Output stations allow students to demonstrate their understanding through categorization, writing, drawing, and assessments. A bonus station challenges early finishers with extension activities.

The explanation phase includes editable PowerPoints, interactive notebooks, and note-taking templates in English and Spanish. Students elaborate through choice projects that extend learning in class or at home. Evaluation includes STAAR 2.0-aligned assessments, review questions, and discussion worksheets.

This flexible lesson can be used in both physical and virtual classrooms, making it an engaging and accessible resource for teaching natural resources and environmental impact.

Engage your 4th-grade students with this student-led station lab on Natural Resources and the Environment. Designed for both in-class and virtual learning, this lesson guides students to explore how energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and how their use impacts the environment through nine interactive stations featuring videos, readings, research, and hands-on tasks.

Students demonstrate their understanding by organizing information, illustrating models, writing responses, and completing assessments. A bonus challenge station offers extension activities, while differentiated reading passages in English and Spanish support diverse learners.

This modular, low-prep resource fosters active learning and critical thinking, allowing students to direct their own learning while teachers facilitate engagement.

The Natural Resources and the Environment Student Choice Projects provide 4th-grade students with engaging, multimodal options to demonstrate their understanding. A project page outlines six student-led choices plus a “design your own” project, all supported by an editable rubric for teacher, peer, or self-assessment.

These flexible projects allow teachers to modify the rubric to fit grading needs and offer differentiated options to support diverse learners. A modified project page provides targeted choices for students needing remediation, while advanced learners can complete multiple projects using the same rubric.

The projects utilize common classroom materials like paper, markers, and scissors, with many options available for digital completion. A teacher directions page offers guidance, ensuring ease of implementation.

The Natural Resources and the Environment science writing activity engages 4th-grade students in a news event report-style exercise to test their earth science knowledge. This print-or-digital activity fosters science reasoning, exploration, and writing skills while supporting both in-person and virtual learning.

Aligned with NGSS 4-ESS3-1, this low-prep, student-centered resource helps students describe how energy and fuels come from natural resources and impact the environment. It includes teacher directions with answer guides and rubrics, projection and print handouts, and a digital PowerPoint version adaptable for Google Slides. Full-sized and half-sheet handouts provide structured prompts, self-checks, and pre-writing strategies, making it easy to integrate into interactive notebooks or writing journals.

Ideal for cross-curricular activities, pre-test assessments, student choice projects, elaboration, extra credit, make-up work, TELPAS samples, or differentiation, this writing prompt is a valuable addition to any classroom.

The WIKI Tickets© Earth/Space Science Set provides 33 engaging formative assessments for 3rd–5th grade science. Each topic includes five format options: a full-screen projection version, three printable handout sizes, and an interactive digital version compatible with PowerPoint and Google Slides.

Aligned with NGSS and TEKS standards, these assessments cover key earth, space, and weather science topics such as the water cycle, Earth's rotation, landscape changes over time, natural resources, and weather patterns. Some topics have multiple tickets, ensuring comprehensive coverage of all standards. A bonus table of contents file is included for easy alignment reference.

WIKI Tickets© can be used in both in-person and virtual learning environments. Students can respond on paper, interact digitally, or complete assignments remotely. These assessments work as exit tickets, bellringers, or quick checks, helping you gauge student understanding in a flexible and engaging way.

Year-Round Resources

These year-round activities will increase your students' understanding of many middle school science topics. All of these activities are also included in the Kesler Science Membership.

Visual Data & Graphing

You're not alone if your students struggle with understanding graphs, charts, and tables. It's a skill that takes an enormous amount of practice. This resource will help students build a strong foundation in analyzing data and creating their own data visualizations.

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Bell Ringers and Warm-Ups

These middle school science bell ringers are an excellent way to engage your students as soon as they walk into your classroom. This comprehensive FULL YEAR resource includes everything you need to start off each science class with an interesting warm-up activity.

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Review Board Games

Each game board has been carefully designed to keep students engaged. There are 10 different action spaces on each board and dozens of question cards. All of the actions are related to science concepts and keep the students motivated throughout the game.

Each game is ready to play. Simply print out the board and the cards and let the students enjoy reviewing nine different units.

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Essential Questions and Standards

Below are the essential questions and standards associated with the lessons and activities included in the energy and fossil fuels unit. This topic is only one of more than 100 middle school science topics included in the Kesler Science Membership.

Essential Questions

Describe the types of energy and fuels we obtain from natural resources.
In what ways do these natural resources and their uses affect the environment?

Standards

NGSS - 4-ESS3-1 Energy & Fossil Fuels