California CAASPP Science Practice Test for Grade 5

About this resource

What's inside this resource

California CAASPP Science Practice Test for Grade 5

This 5th Grade CAASPP Science Practice Test is the perfect way to help students build confidence and master NGSS standards before the CAST exam. With rigorous, test-aligned questions and a full performance task, this resource prepares students for real testing conditions.

What’s Included

✅ Full-length Grade 5 CAASPP/CAST Science Practice Test
✅ 34 questions covering all science domains
✅ Segment A: Physical, Life, and Earth Science questions
✅ Segment B: Performance Task on ocean acidification
✅ Constructed response questions with rubrics
✅ Detailed Answer Key with explanations
✅ Comprehensive Teacher’s Guide with standards alignment and pacing
✅ Printable, student-friendly format

How It Works in the Classroom

This 5th grade science test prep resource is flexible and easy to implement:

Use as a full-length practice test before CAASPP
Assign sections for spiral review or weekly assessments
Perfect for test prep centers or independent practice
Ideal for sub plans or benchmark assessments
Great for small group reteaching using data-driven instruction

Standards & Learning Goals

Aligned to CA NGSS Grade 5 Performance Expectations, including:

5-PS1: Matter & its interactions
5-PS2 & 5-PS3: Motion and energy
5-LS1 & 5-LS2: Life science and ecosystems
5-ESS1–3: Earth systems, space, and human impact

Students will:
✔ Analyze data and scientific scenarios
✔ Explain phenomena using evidence
✔ Apply crosscutting concepts and reasoning
✔ Practice multi-step, higher-order thinking

Why Teachers Love It

⭐ Test-aligned format mirrors real CAASPP expectations
⭐ Saves prep time with ready-to-use materials
⭐ Covers ALL domains in one resource
⭐ Includes answer explanations for easy grading
⭐ Builds student confidence before testing
⭐ Supports differentiation with multiple question types

Make CAASPP prep simple and effective with this 5th grade science practice test—your students will feel prepared, confident, and ready to succeed!

In the classroom

Teaching tips & learning objectives

Learning objectives

Students explain conservation of matter across physical and chemical changes (e.g., dissolving sugar, a burning candle) using evidence rather than assumption.
Students describe how energy and matter move through food chains and ecosystems, including trophic energy loss and decomposer cycling.
Students explain interactions among Earth's four spheres (atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, geosphere) using a real-world ocean acidification scenario.
Students synthesize evidence across multiple sources to recommend and justify long-term and short-term solutions to an environmental problem, explaining trade-offs.

Teaching tips

Pre-teach key performance-task vocabulary before Segment B — acidification, carbonate, hydrosphere, geosphere, biosphere, atmosphere, criterion, constraint, trade-off — as the teacher's guide recommends.
Use the provided sentence frames for the two constructed-response questions to scaffold struggling writers and English learners.
Score the objective items with the answer key, hand-score the two constructed-response items with the included rubrics, and log results on the class tracking sheet to spot domain-level gaps before the spring CAST.
Extend advanced students with the guide's suggested challenge of adding a fourth Earth-sphere interaction to their Q34 explanation or designing a controlled experiment on CO2 and shell growth.

Skills covered

Conservation of matter reasoning — students use particle-model evidence to explain where matter goes during dissolving, burning, and chemical reactions.
Multi-source evidence synthesis — students read four sources on ocean acidification and combine evidence to answer selected-response, multi-select, and constructed-response questions.
Data interpretation — students read a pH-versus-shell-thickness data table to identify patterns and make quantitative predictions.
Engineering trade-off evaluation — students weigh short-term local fixes like calcium oxide buffering against long-term root-cause solutions like reducing CO2 emissions, justifying recommendations with evidence.

Good to know

Questions teachers ask about this resource

How does the demand on Grade 5 students differ from Grade 3, according to the teacher's guide?

Grade 5 requires quantitative proof that matter is conserved, interactions among all four Earth spheres instead of two, more complex matter-cycling system models, explicit engineering trade-off analysis, and more demanding data analysis than Grade 3.

What supports does the teacher's guide suggest for English learners completing the constructed-response questions?

It recommends pre-teaching vocabulary with labeled diagrams, walking through the data table as a class before independent work, providing sentence frames for both constructed-response items, and allowing students to annotate sources in their home language before writing in English.