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.
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Students will watch and examine a NASA animation of Earth’s rising surface temperatures over an almost 150 year period.
Examine (daytime) surface temperature and solar radiation received at locations found near similar latitudes using NASA Data.
Students will analyze and interpret maps of the average net atmospheric radiation to compare the flow of energy from the Sun toward Earth in different months and for cloudy versus clear days. Students will draw conclusions and support them with evidence.
This lesson is designed to help students analyze the interaction between different cloud heights and Earth's incoming and outgoing energy.
In this mini lesson, students analyze a bar graph showing the relative forcings from natural and human factors that affect Earth's climate. They use information from this graph to assess the relative importance of these factors.
Students analyze diagrams showing the effects of clouds on Earth’s Radiation and answer the questions that follow. This mini lesson is designed to help students analyze the interaction between clouds and Earth's incoming and outgoing energy.
Guided by the 5E model, this lesson allows students to work together to uncover how changes in sea ice extent in the Arctic and Antarctic regions are connected to Earth’s energy budget.
Students will investigate the role of clouds and their contribution (if any) to global warming. Working in cooperative groups, students will make a claim about the future role clouds will play in Earth’s Energy Budget if temperatures continue to increase.
This unit plan is published by the NASA Climate Change Research Initiative's (CCRI) Applied Research STEM Curriculum Portfolio. The CCRI Unit Plan, called “Urban Surface Temperatures and the Urban Heat Island Effects,“ has the purpose to educate students how climate is changi