Teaching Climate Change: Lessons from the Past

Historical isotopic temperature record from the Vostok ice core
Image from Petit et al., 2000 and the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (more info)

August 14 evening and August 15, 2006
Montana State University, Bozeman, MT

Co-Sponsored by AMQUA and USNC-INQUA


See the workshop program, with links to PowerPoint presentations and summaries from the workshop discussions.

This workshop was held immediately prior to the biennial AMQUA meeting in Bozeman, Montana. The workshop was open to instructors at the undergraduate and graduate levels and provided an opportunity for the teaching community to exchange ideas and share the best instructional materials on the subject of past climate change.

The goals of the workshop were to:

  • share information about the state of the art in modern research on climate change
  • integrate research and education through linking scientific methods and results with effective instructional practice,
  • demonstrate a variety of instructional methods and activities related to climate change, and
  • develop a plan to expand the coverage of climate change in undergraduate Earth science education (at all types of institutions and across the curriculum).

Workshop activities included large and small group discussions, demonstrations, and planning/writing sessions. Instructional materials and other information is being organized and compiled as collections of digital resources for use by instructors of climate change throughout the world.

Keynote speakers were:

  • Dr. William F. Ruddiman, Dept. of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia
  • Dr Mark Chandler, Columbia University - CCSR/GISS

Organizing Committee:

  • Allan Ashworth, North Dakota State University
  • Sheri Fritz, University of Nebraska
  • Cathy Whitlock, Montana State University
  • Dave Mogk, Montana State University

For more information on the 2006 AMQUA Meeting, see http://bsi.montana.edu/amqua (this website is listed for archival purposes only, it has been taken down)

This workshop is part of the On the Cutting Edge professional development program for current and future geoscience faculty, supported by the National Association of Geoscience Teachers with funding provided by a grant from the National Science Foundation - Division of Undergraduate Education . This workshop was built upon prior workshops such as Using Data in the Classroom, Using Global Data Sets in Teaching Earth Processes, and Teaching Geoscience with Visualizations: Using Images, Animations and Modules Effectively. We are part of the Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE).