Exploring salinity patterns is a great way to better understand the relationships between the water cycle, ocean circulation, and climate. In this mini lesson, students analyze sea surface salinity mapped plots created from the Earth System Data Explorer, paired with questions (and answers) from the Aquarius Mission. Credit: Aquarius Education
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This mini-lesson features time-series graphs of mean salinity at the surface for the Arctic and Antarctic regions. A series of questions guides students in their analysis.
Background information on the El Nino Southern Oscillation or ENSO.
Hands-on demonstration of the El Niño Effect, trade winds, and upwelling provided by NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab.
Explore the energy and matter cycles found within the Earth System.
Background information on ocean circulation.
Students develop and test a hypothesis about how albedo affects temperature.
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.
Students will make a claim about whether changing albedo contributes to changes in Arctic habitats.
Explore and connect to hydrosphere protocols in GLOBE. Each protocol has related Earth System Data Explorer datasets identified as well.