Students who demonstrate understanding can: Evaluate competing design solutions for maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem services.*
Clarification statement: Examples of ecosystem services could include water purification, nutrient recycling, and prevention of soil erosion. Examples of design solution constraints could include scientific, economic, and social considerations.
Official wording from the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States, 2013). NGSS is a registered trademark of WestEd. Neither WestEd nor the lead states and partners that developed the NGSS were involved in the production of this page, and they do not endorse it. View on nextgenscience.org
Healthy ecosystems do jobs for people for free. Wetlands filter water, forests hold soil in place and prevent erosion, and soil organisms recycle nutrients that farms depend on. These benefits are called ecosystem services, and they rely on biodiversity, the variety of living things in an area. When people build, farm or fish, they make choices that can protect or damage these services.
As an engineering-linked expectation, students evaluate competing design solutions. For example, a town might reduce flooding by building a concrete channel, restoring a wetland, or planting trees along a river. Students compare options against criteria, such as how well each protects biodiversity and water quality, and constraints, such as cost, space and community needs. They weigh scientific, economic and social considerations rather than looking for a single perfect answer.
A decision matrix that scores each solution on each criterion is a common tool, and students should justify their scores with evidence.
Ecosystem services such as natural flood control or clean water can be cheaper than building and maintaining human-made replacements.
Biodiversity includes the variety of all species, including plants, fungi and microorganisms, and the variety of ecosystems and genetic differences.
Design choices involve trade-offs. A solution can be the best fit for one community's constraints and a poor fit elsewhere.
A town must reduce flooding. Option A is a concrete flood channel. Option B is restoring a wetland upstream. Score each from 1 (poor) to 3 (good) on cost, flood control and biodiversity, then recommend one.
Answer: Option B, the restored wetland, scores 7 against 5 because it protects biodiversity and provides extra ecosystem services, even though the concrete channel moves floodwater faster.
Use a local issue when possible, such as a park plan or a stream restoration, and invite students to role-play stakeholders with different priorities. Have teams build a decision matrix, then defend their weighting of the criteria to the class.
Assessment asks students to evaluate competing solutions, so the strongest responses compare at least two options using specific evidence and acknowledge a trade-off.
Original questions written for this standard. Choose an option or type your answer, then press Check. Every question has a worked explanation.
Answer: A) A wetland filtering pollutants from water
Ecosystem services are benefits provided by ecosystems, such as natural water filtering.
Answer: biodiversity (also accepted: biological diversity)
Biodiversity is the variety of species, genes and ecosystems.
Answer: C) A limit, such as cost or available space
Constraints are limits that a solution must work within.
Answer: B) Holding soil in place and reducing erosion
Roots stabilize soil, and the trees provide habitat and shade.
Answer: A) To judge trade-offs and choose the best fit for the situation
Comparing against several criteria shows the strengths and weaknesses of each option.
Design, evaluate, and refine a solution for reducing the impacts of human activities on the environment and biodiversity.*
Evaluate a solution to a complex real-world problem based on prioritized criteria and trade-offs that account for a range of constraints, including cost, safety, reliability, and aesthetics as well as possible social, cultural, and environmental impacts.
A full lesson with slides, activities and an exit ticket on designing to protect biodiversity, pitched to grades 6-8 and editable in PowerPoint or Google Slides.
Make a lesson βA printable, differentiated worksheet on MS-LS2-5 with an answer key, ready in about a minute.
Make a worksheet βTurn designing to protect biodiversity into a quiz students answer online that marks itself, with a class summary for you.
Build a test βYes. It is marked with an asterisk because it integrates engineering design: students evaluate competing solutions using criteria and constraints.
The clarification statement lists scientific, economic and social considerations.