New Jersey Student Learning Assessments Science Grade 8

1.Iron from the old mines of the New Jersey Highlands is made of iron atoms. A neutral iron atom has 26 protons. What does 26 identify?

2.A drop from the Raritan River contains particles made of two hydrogen atoms bonded to one oxygen atom. What is each of those particles?

3.Oxygen in the air over Sandy Hook is made of only oxygen atoms. Which classification fits pure oxygen?

4.Sodium chloride, the salt in a Cape May kitchen, contains sodium and chlorine chemically joined in a fixed ratio. What is sodium chloride?

5.Ice from Lake Hopatcong melts in a cup. The liquid is still water. Which change is this?

6.A steel railing along the Hoboken waterfront turns reddish brown and flakes after months in damp air. What does that result show?

7.A sealed jar in a Trenton classroom has a mass of 240 grams. A change occurs inside, and the jar stays closed. Which mass should the jar have after the change?

8.A train leaves Newark Penn Station and later passes a signal post. Which statement describes the train's motion?

9.A student walks 40 meters along the Asbury Park boardwalk in 20 seconds at a steady pace. What is the average speed?

10.A cart of mass 6 kilograms has a net force of 12 newtons in the direction of motion. What is the acceleration?

11.A backpack rests on the ground at High Point, the highest place in New Jersey. Which force pulls the backpack toward Earth?

12.A swing at Branch Brook Park in Newark is held still at its highest point. Just before it is released, which energy is greatest?

13.A toaster in a New Brunswick kitchen warms bread after it is switched on. Which energy transformation occurs in the toaster?

14.A metal spoon sits in hot soup in a Jersey City diner. Soon the handle feels warm. How did heat reach the handle?

15.On Barnegat Bay, evenly spaced water waves pass a dock. The distance from one crest to the next crest is 4 meters. What property is 4 meters?

16.In a school hallway in Princeton, a student sees their face in a flat mirror. What happened to the light?

17.The cliffs of the Palisades formed when molten rock cooled and hardened underground. Which rock type is that cooled material?

18.Most earthquakes happen where huge sections of Earth's outer shell lock and then slip. What is the usual cause?

19.A forecast says Newark will be rainy and 11 degrees Celsius tomorrow afternoon. What kind of information is that?

20.Measurements show that burning coal, oil, and natural gas has increased carbon dioxide in the air, and Earth's average temperature has risen. Which statement is the scientific claim?

21.A neutral magnesium atom has 12 protons. How many electrons does that neutral atom have?

22.Two oxygen atoms stay bonded as O2 in the air over Island Beach State Park. What is O2 an example of?

23.The graphite in a pencil at a Paterson school is a form of carbon, made of carbon atoms only. Which word classifies carbon?

24.Water in the Delaware River has the formula H2O. Hydrogen and oxygen are different elements joined chemically. What is water?

25.Sugar stirred into hot tea in Hoboken disappears from view, and the tea tastes sweet. Evaporating the water leaves the sugar behind. Which change is this dissolving?

26.A silver fork stored in Montclair develops a dark coating. The dark material is a new substance on the metal. What kind of change is that?

27.An open pan of water on a stove in Cherry Hill has a mass of 500 grams. After some water boils away, the pan and the water still in it have a mass of 460 grams. Where is the missing 40 grams?

28.A coin lies on the dashboard of a car stopped in Paterson. The car starts forward quickly, and the coin slides backward relative to the dashboard. Why?

29.A runner on a 400-meter track in New Brunswick completes one full lap and stops at the starting line. Which statement is true?

30.A ferry crosses part of the Hudson River near Hoboken. Which unit is a unit of speed?

31.A book rests on a desk in Edison and does not start moving. What is the net force on the book?

32.A student has a mass of 40 kilograms in Trenton. On the Moon, gravity is weaker. Which comparison is correct?

33.A sled starts from rest at the top of a small snowy hill in Vernon and speeds up as it slides down. Which energy change happens?

34.A lamp in a library in Morristown is switched on. The bulb glows and also becomes hot. Which energy transformation occurs?

35.A wooden bench at Island Beach State Park warms in bright sunlight while the air is still. How does energy from the Sun reach the bench?

36.Students in a Camden gym send a pulse along a rope. The rope moves up and down while the pulse travels forward along the rope. What kind of wave is the pulse?

37.A straw in a glass of water at a diner in Red Bank looks bent at the waterline. The straw is straight. What causes the bent look?

38.A road cut in the Newark Basin shows flat layers made of bits of older rock that were deposited and stuck together. Which rock type are those layers?

39.Many volcanoes form where tectonic plates move apart or where one plate sinks beneath another. Why can molten rock reach the surface in those places?

40.Over many decades, winters in northwestern New Jersey are usually cold, and some storms bring snow. Which statement uses that fact correctly?

41.Carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere absorbs some heat that the surface gives off. What does carbon dioxide do in that process?

42.Nearly all the mass of a helium atom is packed in a tiny center. The electrons stay outside that center. What is the center called?

43.In a hydrogen molecule, H2, two hydrogen atoms stay together. What holds those two atoms in the molecule?

44.Air over the Meadowlands contains nitrogen, oxygen, argon, and water vapor that are not chemically joined as one substance. What is air?

45.A student in Vineland crushes an empty aluminum can. The shape changes, and the can is still aluminum. Which change is this?

46.In a fireplace in Newton, a log burns until ash remains and smoke has left the chimney. What does that result show?

47.A sealed bag in a classroom in Union contains 180 grams of material. The bag puffs up during a change, nothing leaks, and the balance still reads 180 grams. Why did the reading stay the same?

48.Two bikes in Liberty State Park travel at 4 meters per second. One heads north and the other heads east. What is different about their motion?

49.A graph of a parked car in Woodbridge plots position on the vertical axis and time on the horizontal axis. The line stays horizontal for 30 seconds. What was the car doing?

50.Kayaker A travels 100 meters on a Pine Barrens creek in 50 seconds. Kayaker B travels 100 meters on the same creek in 25 seconds. Which statement is correct?

51.A skateboarder in Asbury Park speeds up from 1 meter per second to 4 meters per second while rolling forward. What is that change called?

52.In a classroom in Freehold, a steel bolt and a heavier steel washer are released together from the same low height. Air resistance is very small. What happens?

53.The Moon keeps circling Earth instead of flying off in a straight line. Which force causes that curved path?

54.Two carts roll at the same speed across a gym floor in Wayne. Cart Y has more mass than cart Z. Which cart has more kinetic energy?

55.A student in Somerville compresses a spring toy and holds it still. What energy is stored in the compressed spring?

56.Panels on a school roof in Edison produce electricity while sunlight falls on them. Which energy transformation is that?

57.On a sunny afternoon at Cape May, warm air over the land rises, and cooler air from the ocean moves in. What heat-transfer process is the moving air?

58.A foghorn on a boat near Sandy Hook is easy to hear across the deck. Why would that same vibration produce no traveling sound in a vacuum?

59.A person shouts toward the Palisades cliff and hears the shout return a moment later. What happened to the sound?

60.Rock deep under the New Jersey Highlands is squeezed and heated, but it does not melt. Its minerals rearrange into a new rock. What type of rock forms?

61.At a mid-ocean ridge, two tectonic plates move away from each other and molten rock rises. What kind of plate boundary is that?

62.A table lists Trenton's average July high temperature from 30 years of records. A note says it is raining in Trenton right now. Which pairing is correct?

63.Trees in Wharton State Forest take in carbon dioxide as they grow. A large stand of those trees is cut and not replaced. Which scientific statement fits?

64.Carbon-12 and carbon-14 are both carbon. Carbon-14 has more neutrons than carbon-12. What is the same in both atoms?

65.One substance has the formula CO2 and contains carbon and oxygen chemically combined. A second substance is pure copper metal. Which statement is correct?

66.A puddle in a Paramus parking lot freezes overnight. The ice is still water. Which statement describes the change?

67.Batter baked in an oven in Maplewood becomes a firm, browned muffin and does not turn back into batter when it cools. What does that result show?

68.During a chemical change in a closed box, atoms regroup into different substances. A student says the atoms were destroyed. What is wrong with that claim?

69.A soccer ball rolled across a grass field in Camden slows and stops. No one kicks it again. What force mainly changes its horizontal motion?

70.A swimmer at the Jersey Shore pushes water backward and moves forward. Which statement matches Newton's third law?

71.Earth pulls more strongly on a satellite in a lower orbit than on the same satellite in a higher orbit. What does that show?

72.One bicycle is parked at ground level in New Brunswick. An identical bicycle is parked on a high balcony of the same building. Which bicycle has more gravitational potential energy?

73.A drummer in a school band in Teaneck strikes a drum. The drumhead vibrates, and a sound is heard. Which energy transformation occurs?

74.A foam cup and a metal cup hold equally hot cocoa in a shop in Princeton. The outside of the metal cup feels much hotter. Why?

75.A wave off Long Beach Island has tall crests during a storm and low crests on the next calm day. The frequency stays the same. What changed?

76.Sunlight passes through a glass prism in a Livingston classroom and spreads into a band of colors on the wall. What spreads the colors?

77.Ice and rain slowly break bedrock in the New Jersey Highlands into smaller pieces of the same minerals. What part of the rock cycle is that breaking?

78.Two tectonic plates slide past each other. Stress builds, the rock slips, and the ground shakes. This event does not build a new mountain range. What occurred?

79.A blizzard drops heavy snow on Morristown for one day. A classmate says that single day proves New Jersey's climate is now a permanent blizzard. What is the better science statement?

80.The greenhouse effect has warmed Earth's surface for a very long time. Human activity has added carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Which claim matches the evidence?

81.A student models one molecule of carbon dioxide as one carbon atom bonded to two oxygen atoms. How many atoms are in that one molecule?

82.On a classroom periodic table in Hackensack, the box for nitrogen shows atomic number 7. What does that box represent?

83.Students model ice, liquid water, and water vapor from Round Valley Reservoir. Which description of the particles is best?

84.Water boils in a kettle in a home in Bloomfield. The steam is still water. Which change is boiling?

85.At a dock on the Manasquan River, a cork floats in a tub of water and a small stone sinks. Which statement explains the difference?

86.A rider on a moving train in Secaucus says the platform slides backward. The platform is fixed to the ground. What is the rider describing?

87.The only horizontal forces on a wagon in a Ridgewood driveway are 10 newtons east and 4 newtons west. What is the net force?

88.In a library in Montclair, it is harder to start a full book cart moving than an empty cart on the same floor. Why?

89.Two baseballs have the same mass in a park in Hoboken. One is tossed gently, and the other is pitched much faster. Which ball has more kinetic energy?

90.A student eats breakfast and later runs along the canal in Lambertville. Which energy transformation happens in the student's body during the run?

91.A heater warms the air in a room in Bayonne. Warm air rises, and cooler air moves along the floor toward the heater. What process carries heat through the room?

92.A flute in a Princeton concert plays a high note and then a low note. The high note makes more vibrations each second. Which wave property is greater for the high note?

93.At sunset, a student sees a clear image of the sky on a calm reservoir. Wind makes ripples, and the clear image breaks apart. Why is the image lost?

94.The Delaware River carries sand and silt downstream and drops some of it where the water slows. Which two rock-cycle processes does that trip name?

95.An oceanic plate sinks beneath another plate. Rock melts, and a chain of volcanoes can form. What kind of plate boundary is this?

96.Records over many years show milder winters at Cape May than at High Point. Both places are in New Jersey. What does that difference describe?

97.Scientists compare carbon dioxide measurements with global temperature records over many decades. Which statement is a scientific claim about human impact?

98.Two atoms each have 17 protons. One has 18 neutrons, and the other has 20 neutrons. Which statement is correct?

99.Every sample of pure water has two hydrogen atoms for each oxygen atom. A scoop of trail mix from Stokes State Forest has no fixed amount of each ingredient. Which comparison is correct?

100.Water vapor over Raritan Bay cools and becomes liquid droplets in a cloud. The droplets are still water. What change is this?

101.A picture hangs still on a wall in Summit. The wire pulls up, and gravity pulls down. The picture does not start moving. What is true?

102.A boat on the Navesink River moves in a straight line at a steady speed. The net force on the boat is zero. Which statement fits?

103.High and low tides along the New Jersey shore rise and fall on a regular schedule. Which pull is a main cause of those tides?

104.A roller coaster car at an amusement park in Jackson is nearly at rest at the top of a hill, then speeds up as it goes down. Where is its kinetic energy greatest in this part of the ride?

105.A pitch pine in the Pine Barrens makes food in its needles while sunlight falls on them. Which energy transformation is photosynthesis?

106.On a sunny day in Atlantic City, a black shirt feels hotter than a white shirt worn for the same time. What explains the difference?

107.A wave in a classroom tank has a frequency of 2 hertz and a wavelength of 3 meters. What is the wave speed?

108.A grain of sediment from the New Jersey Coastal Plain becomes part of a sedimentary rock, later changes under heat and pressure, and could someday melt. What does that path show?