This assignment pulls data (CO2 levels, sea levels, temperature, etc) from climate.nasa.gov and asks students to analyze the graphs to see what kind of evidence we have for climate change. It also asks students to summarize what they understand about climate change based on this data. It is aligned to Indiana Science Standard 8.ESS.1.
The average global temperature has been on a rising trend since the 1960s.
In the last 100 years, about how much has the average global temperature changed? (To the nearest tenth)
What do you suppose might be the cause of this change in the average global temperature?
What do greenhouse gases do?
Explain what happens when there is a lot of extra greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. Explain what happens when there's not enough greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. Based on those answers, are greenhouse gases inherently good or bad? Explain.
Carbon dioxide (formula shown below) is a greenhouse gas. The graphs below shows how many molecules of carbon dioxide have been in a million molecules of our atmosphere over a number of years (taken from climate.nasa.gov). Use these graphs to answer the next two questions.
How much more carbon dioxide was in our atmosphere in 2017 than in 2006 (answer in ppm)?
What was the highest historical carbon dioxide level (2nd graph)? What is our carbon dioxide level now (1st graph)? Why is this information useful to us?
Which best describes the amount of ice in the Arctice and Antarctic regions of Earth?
What do you suppose is causing this general trend in the amount of ice on Earth's poles?
About how much as the Earth's average sea level changed in the since 1993 (in mm)? Has it increased or decreased?
What do you suppose is causing this change in the Earth's average sea level?
Do some research. What does "global warming" refer to? What does "climate change" refer to?
Write 4-6 sentences that summarizes all of the information in this assigment (global temperatures, amount of ice, sea level, greenhouse gases, amount of carbon dioxide, global warming, and climate change). Be very descriptive.