NSES Content Standard Unifying Concepts and Processes:   Constancy, change, and measurement  Grades K-12, page 118  Scale includes understanding that different characteristics, properties, or relationships within a system might change as its dimensions are increased or decreased.

 
Benchmark 11D Common Themes: Scale
Grades 6-8, page 278
Properties of systems that depend on volume, such as capacity and weight, change out of proportion to properties that depend on area, such as strength or surface processes.

Benchmark 11D Common Themes: Scale
Grades 9-12, page 279
As the number of parts of a system grows in size, the number of possible internal interactions increases much more rapidly, roughly with the square of the number of parts.

See also Chapter 11 Common Themes, Section D: Scale, for precursor ideas.