Use the Data Literacy Cube to guide students’ exploration of mapped data of the Earth System to enrich their observations and inferences.  This is a flexible resource that may be used with a variety of mapped images.  This activity requires a map of Earth data for students to evalu

Students observe monthly images of changing vegetation patterns, looking for seasonal changes occurring throughout 2017. These data can be used by students to develop their own models of change.

This mini lesson focuses on the 2015-2016 El Niño event and how its weather conditions triggered regional disease outbreaks throughout the world. Students will review a NASA article and watch the associated video to use as a tool to compare with maps related to 2015-2016 rainfall and elevated disease risk, and answer the questions.

Students will use coloring sheets to create a color coded model of El Niño and analyze it. If the Data Literacy Map Cube is used with this, students will color their models first.

Students observe seasonal images of Monthly Leaf Area, looking for any changes that are occurring throughout the year.

Explore using units for calculations with Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). NDVI is a ratio of different light wavelength reflectance which can be used to map the density of green vegetation.

Students learn how to estimate the "energy efficiency" of photosynthesis, or the amount of energy that plants absorb for any given location on Earth. This is the ratio of the amount of energy stored to the amount of light energy absorbed and is used to evaluate and model photosynthesis efficiency.

This NASA visualization shows sea surface salinity observations (September 2011-September 2014). Students review the video and answer questions.

This mini lesson engages students by watching a NASA video related to plant growth activity around the world using data from the NASA/NOAA Suomi NPP satellite and answering questions on these stability and change relationships.

Students review a video showing how the ocean is warmed by solar energy. This is the first video of a four-part series on the water cycle, which follows the journey of water from the ocean to the atmosphere, to the land, and back again to the ocean.