Using various visualizations (i.e., images, charts, and graphs), students will explore changes in sea ice extent as it relates to other spheres within the Earth System. This StoryMap is intended to be used with students who have access to the internet in a 1:1 or 1:2 setting.

In this lesson, students will investigate the drivers of climate change, including adding carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, sea level rise, and the effect of decreasing sea ice on temperatures.

Help learners envision themselves as explorers, scientists, technologists, engineers, and mathematicians as they venture into the summer months.  Download the PDF of the two sided document on cardstock and have students imagine and illustrate themselves! 

Students will watch a video on the Greenland Ice Sheet and answer questions.

Students examine the two time series images to determine the differences between seasonal ice melt over water versus land.

 Air, Water, Land, & Life: A Global Perspective

Students develop and test a hypothesis about how albedo affects temperature.

Students review a video showing a global view of the top-of-atmosphere shortwave radiation from January 26 and 27, 2012 and answer the questions that follow.

Background information on snow and ice extent.

Students consider the impact of changing conditions on the remote island of Little Diomede, Alaska after they investigate the relationship between seasonal trends in sea ice extent with shortwave and longwave radiation flux described in Earth’s energy budget.