Students will examine a 2014-2015 El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) event to identify relationships among sea surface height, sea surface temperature, precipitation, and wind vectors.

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.

Background information on deforestation.

Students will practice the process of making claims, collecting evidence to support claims, and applying scientific reasoning to connect evidence to claims.

The Earth System Satellite Images, along with the Data Literacy Cubes, helps the learner identify patterns in a specific image.  

Background information on sea and land ice melt.

The Earth System Satellite Images, help the learner visualize how different Earth system variables change over time, establish cause and effect relationships for a specific variable, identify patterns, and determine relationships among variables over one year.

The Earth System Satellite Images, along with the Data Literacy Cubes, helps the learner identify patterns in a specific image.  

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.

The Earth System Satellite Images, along with the Data Literacy Cubes, help the learner visualize how different Earth system variables change over time, identify patterns, and determine relationships among two variables in three months.