Students will analyze the monthly seasonal chlorophyll concentration images in our global oceans for the four different months of 2017, and then answer the following questions.
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Students observe seasonal images of Monthly Leaf Area, looking for any changes that are occurring throughout the year.
The purpose of this lesson is for students to compare data displays to determine which best answers the driving question. To do this they will evaluate the spread of the data and what the displays show.
Explore using units in calculations with the Leaf Area Index (LAI). LAI is a ratio that describes the number of square meters of leaves per square meter of available land surface. Because of the units in the ratio, it is dimensionless.
Explore using units for calculations with Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). NDVI is a ratio of different light wavelength reflectance which can be used to map the density of green vegetation.
Students use Phytopia: Exploration of the Marine Ecosystem, a computer-based tool, to investigate various phytoplankton species and topics relating to phytoplankton biology.
Students will analyze the mapped plot of the historic Ocean Chlorophyll Concentrations at key locations around the world for the period of 1998-2018.
Students analyze and compare satellite data of Ocean Chlorophyll Concentrations with Sea Surface Temperatures, beginning with the North Atlantic region, while answering questions about the global patterns of these phenomenon.
Students develop and test a hypothesis about how albedo affects temperature.