Using a “fun-size” bag of rainbow bite-sized candies learners will place different colored candies on a diagram of the Sun-Earth system to show different space weather conditions during solar minimum and solar maximum.

This USGS activity leads students to an understanding of what remote sensing means and how researchers use it to study changes to the Earth’s surface, such as deforestation. 

Students collect and analyze temperature data to explore what governs how much energy is reflected. 

Students will analyze a projected map of the April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse across the US, with an accompanying data table of the locations and times, to explain how people in different locations experience a solar eclipse.  

Students will analyze and interpret graphs to compare the flow of (shortwave) energy from the Sun toward China over the course of a year on cloudy versus clear days. Students will draw a conclusion and support it with evidence.

Read about Dr. Valerie L. Thomas and her contributions to the Landsat program. Since her Landsat days, Thomas, who later invented and patented the Illusion Transmitter, has actively supported women in STEM. Today, she is still teaching and participating in hands-on STEM programs.

Students move through a series of short activities to explore and evaluate global solar radiation data from NASA satellites.  In this process, students make qualitative and quantitative observations about seasonal variations in net energy input to the Earth System.

Explore and connect to GLOBE protocol bundles. Each bundle has related Earth System Data Explorer datasets identified.

Hurricanes are the most powerful weather event on Earth. NASA’s expertise in space and scientific exploration contributes to essential services provided to the American people by other federal agencies, such as hurricane weather forecasting.

Examine (daytime) surface temperature and solar radiation received at locations found near similar latitudes using NASA Data.