The Heat is On: Understanding Local Climate Change part of Cutting Edge:Visualization:Examples
Students draw conclusions about the extent to which multiple decades of temperature data about Phoenix suggest that a shift in local climate is taking place as opposed to exhibiting nothing more than natural ...

Paleotempestology Lab part of Cutting Edge:Introductory Courses:Activities
Paleotempestology Lab: this lab activity is designed to help students gain experience in relative and absolute dating techniques as well as a sense of how scientific investigations proceed.

Mapping a Local Dune Field and Estimating Paleowind Speed and Direction part of NAGT:Teaching Resources:Teaching in the Field:Field Trip Collection
Donald T. Rodbell, Union College Intended Audience: Undergraduate geomorphology course. Location: Pinebush dune field, eastern New York State (approximately 20 minutes from Union College campus). Summary: We visit ...

Student Lead Discussions: Articles from the Literature and Final Writing Assignment part of Cutting Edge:Hurricanes-Climate Change Connection:Activities
This is a two-stage assignment. The first stage is a student-led discussion of a set of closely related articles selected by the instructors from the climate change literature. The second stage is an 8-12 page ...

Confirmation of the IPCC Prediction re: Increased Storminess part of Cutting Edge:Hurricanes-Climate Change Connection:Activities
A two-part culminating activity for a meteorology/climatology unit in an Earth Science course centered upon data acquisition and analysis regarding the confirmation of the IPCC predicition regarding increased ...

Poleward Heat Transport Jigsaw part of Cutting Edge:Hurricanes-Climate Change Connection:Activities
Based on great plate tectonic exercise by Sawyer et al. (2005 JGE), this small-group exercise with maps of data about earth's energy balance helps students visualize poleward heat transport.

Exploring the Link between Hurricanes and Climate using GCM Results part of Cutting Edge:Hurricanes-Climate Change Connection:Activities
This activity requires students to examine global climate model output available online and consider the potential impact of global warming on tropical cyclone initiation and evolution. As a follow-up, students ...

Is There a Trend in Hurricane Number or Intensity? part of Cutting Edge:Hurricanes-Climate Change Connection:Activities
This lab guides students through an examination of the hurricane record to determine if there is a trend in hurricane intensity over the past 40 years and introduces some issues related to statistics and ...

Carbon Footprint Exercise part of Activities
We designed a three-step assignment for students in introductory geoscience that asks them to calculate their carbon footprint during one specific week. The goal of the assignment is to increase student awareness ...

Calculation of your personal carbon footprint part of Cutting Edge:Energy:Energy Activities
This worksheet walks the students through the steps for calculating their personal carbon footprint. Additionally it helps them consider options for reducing their carbon footprint and the potential costs of those ...

From Grid to Home part of Cutting Edge:Energy:Energy Activities
This one-period classroom activity is designed to have students analyze energy use, cost, and source patterns from household to regional scales and relate these patterns to CO2 emissions. This idea was generated at ...

What are the causes and effects of ENSO? part of Cutting Edge:Complex Systems:Teaching Activities
This NASA Mission Geography module focuses on the evidence for global climate change. In the specific activity on ENSO, students role play policy makers deciding how to allocate Peru's resources to manage for ...

Climate Around the World part of Cutting Edge:Complex Systems:Teaching Activities
This exercise is designed to provide students with an overview of regional climate variations around the world and promote discussion of factors that create differences in climate around the world. This assignment ...

Exercise 5: The human impact of sea level changes, plus extensions to impacts of other natural events on human populations part of Cutting Edge:GIS and Remote Sensing:Activities2
Barbara and David Tewksbury, Hamilton College Summary In this eight-part exercise, students download NOAA high resolution bathy/topo DEMs and TIGER census data to predict the location of shorelines, the extent of ...

Last Glacial Maximum part of Activities
This is an outline of an activity I am developing using model output from the CLIMAP study for my Quaternary Paleoecology and Paleoclimate class.

Greenhouse Effect Lab part of Cutting Edge:Teaching Activities
In this lab, students measure temperature changes inside soda bottles (one with CO2 added, the other with only air inside) as incandescent light is shined on them to model the Greenhouse Effect.

Comparing Carbon Calculators part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Teaching with Data:Examples
Carbon calculators, no matter how well intended as tools to help measure energy footprints, tend to be black boxes and can produce wildly different results, depending on the calculations used to weigh various ...

Marine Oxygen Isotopes and Changes in Global Ice Volume part of Activities
Students explore marine oxygen-isotope data from cores collected by the Ocean Drilling Program. The activity gives students access to real paleoclimate data, develops their skills in organizing and graphing data, ...

Teaching Climate Science by Studying Misinformation part of Activities
Students critically evaluate the arguments about climate change raised in a climate contrarian newspaper op-ed. This strengthens student critical thinking and content knowledge.

Northwest Passage part of Cutting Edge:Teaching Methods:Teaching with Google Earth:Examples
An investigation of changes in polar regions using Google Earth.