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What's Cooking
Students complete a solar radiation activity. In this solar radiation lesson plan, students complete an experiment to learn about solar radiation. Students make solar tea by using the energy of the Sun to brew tea.
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Art: Coral Reef Ala Oil
Students investigate Australia's Great Barrier Reef and create oil paintings of it. After their research, they apply various painting techniques to depict air bubbles, sun's radiation, and color blending. For older students, the...
NASA
Earth's Global Energy Budget
Introduce your earth science enthusiasts to the earth's energy budget. Teach them using an informative set of slides that include illuminating lecturer's notes, relevant vocabulary, embedded animations, colorful satellite maps, and a...
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Variables Affecting Earth's Albedo
Students study the variables that affect the Earth's albedo. In this environmental data analysis activity students interpret and graph information and calculate changes.
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Solar Kit Lesson #9 - Properties of Solar Radiation: Reflection, Transmission, and Absorption
Middle school science stars observe and record data on the solar radiation reflected off or transmitted through various materials. They predict properties for various materials, and test their predictions by touch. This activity becomes...
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How Big Is That Star?
Aspiring astronomers study stars. They compare stars and explain the relationship between radius, mass, and diameter. By creating a star simulation, they discover how a binary star system's orbit can cause changes in the observed...
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An Overview of Solar Radiation
Students examine the Stefan-Boltzmann Law. Students compute basic radiative "constants" of the sun-Earth-atomosphere system. They examine the wavelength of maximum radiation emission.
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Scientist Tracking Network
Students correlate surface radiation with mean surface temperature of several geographic regions. They observe how these parameters change with latitude and construct an understanding of the relationship of solar radiation to seasonal...
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Daily and Seasonal Cycles
First graders identify the sun as a source of heat and light. They identify features of houses that help keep use sheltered and comfortable throughout daily and seasonal cycles. Students are told that summer is the best season to...
Space Awareness
Global Warming of the Atmosphere
Scientists know the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today is higher than at any point in the last 800,000 years. Scholars learn about the amount of thermic radiation absorbed by air and what happens to the rest of the...
Space Awareness
The Thermal Layers of Oceans
How much does the sun heat up a lake or ocean? Scholars use a cup and a strong lamp to investigate the heat transfer and thermal layers in the ocean to come up with the answer. They collect data and graph it in order to better understand...
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TE Lesson: Using Heat from the Sun
Learners examine fossil fuels, nuclear and renewable fuels. They study investigate types of heat transfer such as convection, conduction, and radiation. They complete crossword puzzles based on the vocabulary. They design, construct and...
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Let the Sun Shine!
Students investigate how the sun can be used for energy. They read a handout, discuss the pros and cons of passive solar building design, develop flashcard questions, and identify jobs that can be helped by solar energy.
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Collecting Electromagnetic Radiation
Students using different experiments and activities explore electromagnetic radiation and the effect on the Earth.
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The Reason for the Seasons
Students compare graphs of their data that was generated on a NASA website. In this seasons lesson students complete a lab activity.
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Albedo and Irradiation of Surfaces
Here is a physical science activity where pupils place thermometers inside of a white and a black paper pocket and place them under a lamp. They record and compare the temperature increase over a ten-minute period. Have your class...
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Melts in Your Bag, Not in Your Hands
Students study how the sun transfers heat to the earth through radiation. They examine how animals absorb energy from the sun to warm their bodies by experiment with chocolate melting. They examine sun safety.
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Sensing the Invisible
Students study visible light and explain why we want to use infrared radiation to study Mercury. In this sunlight lesson students construct a device to measure the presence of infrared radiation in sunlight.
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Sunlight and Warm Air
Students discuss radiant energy from the sun, performing a simple experiment with sun glasses and bright light to demonstrate the concept. Students further participate in simple in-class experiments to demonstrate: air density as it...
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Three Methods of Heat Transfer
Students participate in a variety of experiments designed to illustrate types of heat transfer including conduction, convection and radiation. They complete worksheets as an assessment of the experiments.
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Solar Box Cooker
Students explore solar power. In this solar power instructional activity, students build simple solar cookers after they study convection, conduction, and radiation. Students transfer their knowledge of how the solar cooker works to...
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Solar Kit Lesson #7 Positioning Solar Panels I: Explorations with Tracking
Students track and record data on the Sun's position in the sky and on the output of a solar panel tracking the Sun. On a second day, students graph and analyze the data to identify relationships between (1) the time of day, (2) the...
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Heat Transfer
Students examine heat transfer using energy efficient houses. In this heat transfer lesson plan students calculate the heat that is transferred between a system and its surroundings.
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Snow Goggles And Limiting Sunlight
Students investigate the effects of light radiation on the human eyes. They construct a pair of snow goggles that are used to see how a filter can protect the eyes from radiation. Then students explain how the scientific method can be...