National Wildlife Federation
Quantifying Land Changes Over Time Using Landsat
"Humans have become a geologic agent comparable to erosion and [volcanic] eruptions ..." Paul J. Crutzen, a Nobel Prize-winning atmospheric chemist. Using Landsat imagery, scholars create a grid showing land use type, such as urban,...
Curated OER
Land Use Change Over Time
Students use historical aerial photographs and current aerial photographs to compare the change over time to the land. In this land changing lesson plan, students analyze, compare, contrast, and list the land change in their own community.
Chicago Botanic Garden
Historical Climate Cycles
What better way to make predictions about future weather and climate patterns than with actual climate data from the past? Young climatologists analyze data from 400,000 to 10,000 years ago to determine if climate has changed over...
Curated OER
Arkansas: A Changing Climate, a Changing Land
Here is a instructional activity on the climate zones and geography of Arkansas. In it, learners look at maps (embedded) of different climate zones found throughout Arkansas. They engage in discussions regarding how global warming and...
Curated OER
Climate Change in My City
Students investigate the climate changes occurring locally, regionally and globally over the last one hundred years. They brainstorm and predict whether the current year's weather was warmer or colder than last year then check the...
Chicago Botanic Garden
Climate Change Around the World
Look at climate change around the world using graphical representations and a hands-on learning simulation specified to particular cities around the world. Using an interactive website, young scientists follow the provided...
Curated OER
Changing Planet: Melting Glaciers
Resource links to a video, satellite images, data, and photographs of glaciers provide emerging earth scientists the opportunity to examine how the ice has been retreating over the years. A data table is included for pupils to record...
Curated OER
Lesson 2 Activity 2: Mapping Mount St. Helens
Students use topographic map skills to interpret impact of the May 18, 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens on the volcano's topography, and draw profile views of Mount St. Helens before and after the May 18, 1980, eruption.
National Wildlife Federation
Get Your Techno On
Desert regions are hotter for multiple reasons; the lack of vegetation causes the sun's heat to go straight into the surface and the lack of moisture means none of the heat is being transferred into evaporation. This concept, and other...
It's About Time
The Changing Geography of Your Community
Lead your class in exploring their local communities as well as the general environment. As they determine continental distributions by investigating minerals, rocks, and fossils located in their local region, pupils construct...
Center Science Education
Hurricanes and Climate
Feeling under the weather? This lesson on hurricanes can whip things up! With professionally designed maps and handouts, teach your future weathermen (or women) where, when, and how hurricanes occur. They identify hurricane regions and...
Curated OER
These Maps are for the Birds
Students identify and study New York State Breeding Bird Atlas maps to learn where different bird species nest and how their distributions have changed over time. They also identify how maps serve as representations of a geographic...
Curated OER
LLoyd's Corner
Learners write a description of how a local environment has changed over time and why these changes have occurred accordingly. They describe and record changes in Lloyd's corner over time as depicted in pictures taken at four different...
Curated OER
Mapping Ancient Coastlines
Most of this instructional activity is spent working on the "Bathymetry Worksheet." It includes a graph of the changes in sea level over the past 150,000 years and a bathymetric map of changes in an imaginary coastline over time....
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Gorongosa: Making Observations Activity
Do you have young scientists wanting to make new discoveries rather than just completing the same experiments? Young scientists use their observational skills to identify animals and patterns in animal behavior. Through tracking...
Curated OER
Top to Bottom
Marine science classes read about the 2005 North Atlantic Stepping Stones Expedition and review climate change. They use maps to locate the seamount chains. In collaborative groups, they research how climate change may be altering the...
Global Oneness Project
Highways and Change
What is the cost of change? Roberto Guerra's photo essay "La Carretera: Life and Change Along Peru's Interoceanic Highway" asks viewers to consider the impacts of the 1,600 mile-long highway through Peru and Brazil that connects Pacific...
Curated OER
People Change the Landscape
Students examine ways in which humans have brought change to the natural environment. In this ecology and literacy instructional activity, students listen to the book Island Boy by Barbara Cooney. Students observe and define map-reading...
Curated OER
When You Were My Age, What Was This Place Like?
Students discover how land use in their community has changed. In this community and ecology lesson, students scan old newspapers to find articles about the development of community land. Students discuss and predict how land use has...
Curated OER
Studying Snow and Ice Changes
Students compare the change in snow and ice over a 10 year period. In this environmental science lesson, students use the live data on the NASA site to study and compare the monthly snow and ice amounts on a map of the entire...
University of California
Hot! Hot! Hot!
Calories are not tiny creatures that sew your clothes tighter every night, but what are they? A science lesson, presented at multiple levels, has learners experiment with heat, heat transfer, and graph the function over time....
It's About Time
Taking a Ride on a Lithospheric Plate
Assist your pupils and broaden their horizons with several activities that determine the exact positioning of various communities over the globe. Pupils use data from the Global Positioning System to determine the position and rate of...
Curated OER
Mapping Mount St. Helens
Students study topographic maps and contour lines and construct a simple three-dimensional model of Mount St. Helens before the May 18, 1980, eruption. They use topographic map skills to interpret the impact of the May 18, 1980, eruption...
Curated OER
A Comparison Study of Water Vapor Data to Precipitation over North America
Students use NASA satellite data to compare water vapor over the United States. In this data analysis instructional activity students use an Excel spreadsheet to map their data.