This investigation is part of the NASA: Mission Geography Module "What are the causes and consequences of climate change?" that guides students through explorations in climatic variability and evidence for global climate change.
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Watch NASA videos about aerosols and volcanic ash.
Students watch a video explaining albedo and its impact on Earth. The video shows visualizations of albedo across Earth and how it can change. Students will interpret the images in the video and answer questions about albedo.
Students differentiate between data sets of monthly shortwave radiation and monthly cloud coverage to discover a relationship between radiation and clouds by answering analysis questions.
In this lesson, students will explore the effect of aerosols on sky color and visibility by using an interactive virtual model.
Students review Earth System phenomena that are affected by soil moisture. They analyze and evaluate maps of seasonal global surface air temperature and soil moisture data from NASA satellites. Building from their observations, students will select a location in the U.S.
Students analyze a graph that illustrates the change in global surface temperature relative to 1951-1980 average temperatures.
Students analyze surface air temperature anomalies to identify change with respect to different latitudes across the world.