COVID-19 & Health Equity Units

Grades K-2 Unit Grades 3-5 Unit MS Science Unit HS Science Unit

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 unit employs an inquiry-based approach and is designed for 15 class periods of instruction, with optional extensions. Because of its interdisciplinary nature, it is appropriate for use in middle school science, social studies, or health classes.

We are seeking teachers to participate in the field test of this unit. Interested teachers should visit this website to find out more and fill out an interest survey.

Register for our FREE webinar about the unit on January 28th from 1-2 Pacific Time. 

Both the K-2 unit, “What can we do to keep our community healthy?” and the 3-5 unit, “How can we make decisions to care for ourselves, our families, and our communities?” are available now. These units were developed in partnership with NextGen Science Storylines (at Northwestern University), Learning in Places (at Northwestern University and University of Washington), and current classroom teachers from across the country. 

The COVID-19 pandemic is a clear example of how science and society are connected, and these units explore how different communities are impacted by the virus through the lens of historical inequities in society. These multidisciplinary units include integrated social-emotional learning and supports for teachers and families in addressing these emotional topics.

These ready-to-use materials will include 12-14 days of instruction with forty minutes of instruction/day. The materials will guide students and families through the following questions:

• How have our lives changed because of COVID-19? 
• Why have those changes happened? (Should they happen?) 
• How can we care for ourselves, our families, and communities? 

The high school unit, “How can we slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus to protect our communities?” focuses on the science of infectious disease, transmission, and vaccines. Students will learn how COVID-19 impacts communities across the U.S. differently depending on factors that affect the spread of COVID-19. OpenSciEd developed these units in partnership with BSCS Science Learning and current classroom teachers from across the country. These materials can be appropriate for social studies and health courses. Epidemiologists, public health experts, equity and antiracist education experts, community groups, as well as social-emotional learning experts contributed to the material development. In the unit, students will: 

• Determine how COVID spreads in and between communities and use mathematical models and computer simulations of disease transmission to investigate how strategies to mitigate spread should work. 
• Investigate how or why these strategies worked well in some places and not others and how the factors we identified impact the spread of the virus. 
• Explore how racism’s structural inequalities are prevalent today and can explain why some communities are facing much greater impact (spread and mortality) from COVID-19 than others. 
• Discuss how pandemics end, what needs to happen for the COVID-19 pandemic to end, and how to prepare for the next one.