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 learn about and describe the different classifications of Air Quality Index and the importance of standards in air quality monitoring. Students will also use scientific evidence and reasoning to support a claim about long-term trends in air quality in the United States.  

Students will review the sources of the six criteria pollutants for which the EPA has established standards for and describe their impacts on human health and the environment. 

Students will analyze how air pollution may be transported over time. Students will also differentiate between sources of air pollution and describe how air pollution interacts with the Earth System. 

Using hourly graphs of PM 2.5 data and HYSPLIT model trajectories, students will collect evidence for the effects of fireworks on air quality.

Students will analyze and describe the relationship between air pollution and minority and poverty populations. Students will evaluate environmental problems in relation to social inequalities. 

In this story map students will learn about what air pollution is, its environmental impact, the standards used to describe air quality as defined by the Clean Air Act, and the Earth System interactions that drive the transport of air pollution.

In Earth System Science, underling factors affecting observable phenomena can be difficult to identify and describe.  The Iceberg Diagram diagram uses the metaphor of an iceberg to demonstrate the idea of visible vs hidden as it relates to Earth science phenomena.  This teaching strategy helps students to see beyond the obvious and to develop their awareness of the underlying causes, relationships, and/or conditions that can contribute to phenomenological events. It also provides a framework for digging deeper into phenomena-driven lessons in Earth Science.

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.