This lesson incorporates sea surface data collected by NASA satellites. Data for three surface characteristics- height, temperature and speed- are used for several activities. Students examine the differences in speed of currents relative to distance from the Equator. Sea surface data anomalies are charted and further analyzed. In addition, surface current data is presented to examine patterns related to El Niño. Note that this is lesson three of five on the Ocean Motion website. Each lesson investigates ocean surface circulation using satellite and model data and can be done independently. See Related URL's for links to the Ocean Motion Website that provide science background information, data resources, teacher material, student guides and a lesson matrix.

A Day Without Agriculture. This is the Lesson 1 Exposure Activity, from Unit 1 Introduction to Agriculture, from the DIGS (Developing Individuals, Growing Stewards) AmeriCorps Curriculum from CSU. The curriculum focuses on introducing students in grades 3-5 to Colorado agriculture, industry and environmental issues. The curriculum is matched to State Standards 2021. The curriculum upon request. Visit: https://engagement.colostate.edu/programs-old/developing-individuals-growing-stewards/

This humorous short video uses the 'single-cause fallacy' to debunk the myth that current changes in the Earth's climate are a result of natural phenomenon. The video is one of several in the 'Cranky Uncle' series.

This video illustrates the Keeling curve as evidence to establish man's role in global climate change.

This 10 minute video builds connections between topics that are important in climate science such as: the impact of variations in Earth's orbit and wobble on it's axis on climate; how the cores being sampled fit into the bigger climate picture; connecting greenhouse gases to melting ice and sea level changes; the sensitivity of the ice melt / sea level rise relationship; and computer model simulations showing connections between ice sheets and sea level.
The companion website provides resources, an extensive list of activities, teacher guides, posters, and more.

This is a webpage with videos that relate to the Deep Impact Encounter. Learners can watch videos about the mission, encounter, science, and results.

This site from the National Park Service briefly addresses the geology of Devil's Tower. The evolution of various theories on the formation of the tower are discussed. A slide show of the emplacement of the tower is also available.

Determine the dew point temperature for your classroom through a hands-on experiment. Use humidity and temperature probes to investigate the temperature at which it would rain in your classroom! Learn about water density and the conditions necessary to produce fog or rain.

Differentiating open access and open educational resource can be a challenge in some contexts. Excellent resources such as "How Open Is It?: A Guide for Evaluating the Openness of Journals" (CC BY) https://sparcopen.org/our-work/howopenisit created by SPARC, PLOS, and OASPA greatly aid us in understanding the relative openness of journals. However, visual resources to conceptually differentiate open educational resources (OER) from resources disseminated using an open access approach do not currently exist. Until now.

This one page introductory guide differentiates OER and OA materials on the basis of purpose (teaching vs. research), method of access (analog and digital), and in terms of the relative freedoms offered by different levels of Creative Commons licenses, the most common open license. Many other open licenses, including open software licenses also exist.

This contribution is modified from a published exercise "Directed Discovery of Crystal Structures Using Ball-and-Stick Models" [Mogk, 1997] . While the published exercise is based on student exploration of traditional ball-and-stick models of crystal structures, this modified version uses a similar "discovery-based" approach to teach the spatial relationships and crystal-chemical rules that govern the crystal structures of common minerals and crystalline solids, but instead uses the latest web-based crystallographic information and visualization programs. A few changes in the content have been made from the published exercise, mainly to accomodate the new digital media.

(Note: this resource was added to OER Commons as part of a batch upload of over 2,200 records. If you notice an issue with the quality of the metadata, please let us know by using the 'report' button and we will flag it for consideration.)

Oyster Shells is one of the AMNH Education Department's many collections of specimens and artifacts gathered the world over by explorers and scientists. In its online Discovery Collection form, Oyster Shells includes photographs of 15 specimens with classification and distribution details, an interactive key that guides you through specimen identification, an activity where students select and identify a specimen photograph using the interactive identification key and an Educator's Guide with suggestions for how to use the Oyster Shells Discovery Collection in the classroom.

Students will analyze a photograph to learn about body image. They will also discuss how society views the human body in different cultures.

Students will engage in visual and written activities that will support their creative process of choreographing a solo dance composition. The lesson includes motifs and the movement components -- body, effort, shape, and space (BESS elements from Laban Movement Analysis).

Douglas County Colorado presents a virtual museum showcasing the history of the Douglas, County Colorado Region including Castle Rock, Aurora, and Highlands Ranch.

In this video, scientist Dr. Susan Prichard discusses the impact of pine bark beetles on western forests. She explains how climate change, specifically rising temperatures, is exacerbating the problem.

This video, from ClimateCentral, features a team of scientists from the Northern Greenland Eemian Ice Drilling Project who study atmospheric air bubbles trapped in an ice core. This work highlights a period in Greenland's ice sheet which began about 130,000 years ago and lasted about 10,000 years; a period known as the Eemian. The air bubbles from the ancient atmosphere reveal what happened with climate change over that period of time.

In 1931, a severe drought hit the Southern and Midwestern plains. As crops died and winds picked up, dust storms began. As the "Dust Bowl" photograph shows, crops literally blew away in "black blizzards" as years of poor farming practices and over-cultivation combined with the lack of rain. By 1934, 75% of the United States was severely affected by this terrible drought.The one-two punch of economic depression and bad weather put many farmers out of business. In the early 1930s, thousands of Dust Bowl refugees ? mainly from Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado, Kansas, and New Mexico ? packed up their families and migrated west, hoping to find work. Entire families migrated together (such as the men shown in "Three generations of Texans now Drought Refugees") in search of a better life. Images such as "Midcontinent ? Family Standing on the Road with Car," "Drought Refugees," and "Untitled, ca. 1935 (Worn-Down Family in Front of Tent)" offer a glimpse into their experience on the road, and show that cars provided many families both transportation and shelter on the road. About 200,000 of the migrants headed for California. The state needed to figure out how to absorb the thousands of destitute people crossing its borders daily. One of their tactics was to document the plight of the refugees. In 1935, photographer Dorothea Lange joined the Rural Rehabilitation Division of the California State Emergency Relief Administration (SERA), a section of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. She was assigned the job of using her camera to document the growing number of homeless Dust Bowl refugees migrating to California. She worked with Paul S. Taylor, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who was researching conditions of rural poverty in order to make recommendations on how to improve the workers' conditions. The work by Taylor and Lange played an important role in helping to raise public awareness of the crisis. The reports they made for the government included both data and striking images that revealed the desperate conditions in which the migrants lived and confirmed the need for government intervention. Stark images such as "Home of Oklahoma Drought Refugees" resonated with the public, and portraits of drought refugees like "Ruby from Arkansas" and others shown in this topic humanized the migrants for more fortunate citizens. In March 1936, Lange took what became one of her most famous images, "Migrant Mother." This image of a 32-year-old woman became an icon for the suffering of ordinary people during Great Depression.

Using real data, this animated video provides numerous facts comparing human behaviors and Earth characteristics related to climate change through time - from the first Earth Day in 1970, to the 50th anniversary of Earth Day in 2020.

DATA: Sea Floor Age, Volcano and Earthquake Distributions. TOOL: My World GIS. SUMMARY: Identify relationships among sea-floor age, earthquakes, and volcanoes to understand how they support the theory of plate tectonics.

(Note: this resource was added to OER Commons as part of a batch upload of over 2,200 records. If you notice an issue with the quality of the metadata, please let us know by using the 'report' button and we will flag it for consideration.)

DATA: Digital Elevation Model Data. TOOL: GeoMapApp. SUMMARY: Explore a timeline about how we have learned about the oceans. Construct a profile across the Atlantic Ocean and create 3-D visualizations of the seafloor.

(Note: this resource was added to OER Commons as part of a batch upload of over 2,200 records. If you notice an issue with the quality of the metadata, please let us know by using the 'report' button and we will flag it for consideration.)