Analyzing the Antarctic Ozone Hole part of Earth Exploration Toolbook:Analyzing the Antarctic Ozone Hole
DATA: Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) Images. TOOLS: ImageJ, Spreadsheet. SUMMARY: Animate and explore 10 years of Southern Hemisphere ozone images. Then measure and graph the area of the ozone hole over time.

Using GLOBE Data to Study the Earth System part of Earth Exploration Toolbook:Using GLOBE Data to Study Earths System
DATA: Student-collected environmental data TOOL: GLOBE Online Graphing Tool - Explore, graph, and compare data from the GLOBE (Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment) Program.

The Earth's Heat Budget part of NAGT:Teaching Resources:Teaching Materials Collection
Hands-on laboratory activity that allows students to investigate the effects of distance and angle on the input of solar radiation at the Earth's surface; the role played by albedo; and the heat capacity of ...

Sediments and the Global Carbon Cycle part of Cutting Edge:Sedimentary Geology:Activities
This is a series of exercises designed to introduce undergraduate students to the role of sediments and sedimentary rocks in the global carbon cycle and the use of stable carbon isotopes to reconstruct ancient ...

Understanding the Carbon Cycle: A Jigsaw Approach part of Cutting Edge:Climate Change:Activities
In this "jigsaw" exercise, each student is assigned one of five geochemical processes in the carbon cycle to research, fully understand, and then explain to others in groups of five. At the end of class ...

Take A Hike Assignment part of Cutting Edge:Introductory Courses:Activities
Students are assigned to take a hike in a location of their choice and write a concise summary of their observations of Earth Science features and processes. This assignment is used near the end of an Earth Systems ...

Estimating Exchange Rates of Water in Embayments using Simple Budget Equations. part of Quantitative Skills:Activity Collection
Simple budgets may be used to estimate the exchange of water in embayments that capitalize on the concept of steady state and conservation principals. This is especially true for bays that experience a significant exchange of freshwater. This exchange of freshwater may reduce the average salt concentration in the bay compared to seawater if it involves addition of freshwater from rivers, R, and/or precipitation, P. Alternatively, it may increase the average salt concentration in the bay compared to seawater if there is relatively little river input and high evaporation, E. Since freshwater input changes the salt concentration in the bay, and salt is a conservative material, it is possible to combine two steady state budgets for a bay, one for salt and one for water, to solve for the magnitude of the water flows that enter and exit the bay mouth. Students will make actual calculations for the inflow and outflow of water to Puget Sound, Washington and the Mediterranean Sea and compare them to actual measured values.

Tracers in the hydrologic cycle: A jigsaw activity part of Cutting Edge:Complex Systems:Teaching Activities
Using a jigsaw approach, students investigate biogeochemical transformations (nitrate, silica, pH and conductivity) of water as it moves through the hydrologic cycle. The resulting conceptual framework facilitates ...

Review for interdisiplinary science course (stream ecology, watersheds) part of Cutting Edge:Complex Systems:Teaching Activities
This is a large-scale participatory activity used to prompt students to review what they have learned and to think actively and cooperatively about the connections between the systems we have discussed prior to the ...

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 ...

The Non-linearity of Environmental Change: A coral reef model part of Cutting Edge:Environmental Geology:Activities
This is an exercise that is used in an undergraduate, non-major course titled "Coral Reefs: Biology, Geology & Policy". The course uses this popular environment as a proxy for environmental decline ...

Earth's Radiation Budget part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Teaching with Data:Examples
In this activity students explore the Earth's radiation budget using Earth radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) data archived at the IRI/LDEO Climate Data Library (more info) . -

Carbon Dioxide Exercise part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Interactive Lectures:Examples
Students work in groups, plotting carbon dioxide concentrations over time on overheads and estimating the rate of change over five years. -

JiTT - Dam Removal - A Good Idea or Not? part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Just in Time Teaching:Examples
1) What are some of the biological effects of dam removal (good and bad)? 2) What are some of the more pressing/compelling reasons to remove a dam? Explain. 3) The Stanley and Doyle (2003) article states that, ...

Campus Nitrogen Budget part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Campus-Based Learning:Examples
Link the college or university operations with local ecology. In this study, students use a tool from urban ecology, the nitrogen budget, to research the inputs, outputs and subsytem transfers of nitrogen on the ...

Floodplains (with GIS) part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Teaching with GIS:Examples
In this GIS-enhanced lab, students measure a topographic and geologic cross-section across a floodplain by simple surveying and auguring techniques. -

When is Dinner Served? Predicting the Spring Phytoplankton Bloom in the Gulf of Maine (College Level) part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Teaching with GIS:Examples
College-level adaptation of the Earth Exploration Toolbook chapter. Students explore the critical role phytoplankton play in the marine food web. -

Gulf Anoxia Course Project part of Quantitative Skills:Activity Collection
In this activity students work in groups to investigate the problem of Gulf of Mexico hypoxia before developing mitigation strategies based on local contriubtions to the problem. The students present their ideas in a public meeting debate format from which a solution must be selected by the entire class.

Destruction of the Rainforest and Atmospheric Oxygen part of Teacher Preparation:Resource Collections:Activities
Pre-service Midle School teachers devised an experiment to test an assertion that destruction of the Brazilian Rainforest would lead to a serious drop in atmospheric oxygen. The experiment proved to be a failure, but opened other avenues of science learning and had a positive impact on their confidence in teaching inquiry-based science.

Investigative Case - "Goodbye Honey Buckets" part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Investigative Case Based Learning:Examples
Students will investigate arctic geology and hydrology as well as tundra ecology as they consider options for sewage treatment. Public safety, environmental impact, and issues of construction and engineering will be explored.