Climate Change Module part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Scientists agree that the climate is changing and that human activities are a primary cause for this change through increased emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. There have been times in ...

Unit 3: Dynamic Integrated Climate Economy (DICE) Modeling part of Regulating Carbon Emissions
After an opening discussion of systems thinking and models, student use webDICE , an online Dynamic Integrated Climate Economy model developed by Center for Robust Decision Making on Climate and Energy Policy at ...

Unit 6: Carbon Emissions Game part of Regulating Carbon Emissions
In this unit, students play a game, a variation on the "Pollution Game" (Corrigan 2011), to develop an appreciation of the pros and cons of the commonly discussed policy options for carbon abatement ...

Unit 7: Climate Change from the Socio-Environmental Systems Perspective part of Regulating Carbon Emissions
This unit summarizes and synthesizes the previous six units by inviting students to reflect on their experiences throughout the module, identify key learning moments and consider how these events influenced their ...

Unit 5: Abating Carbon Emissions part of Regulating Carbon Emissions
Students evaluate the EPA's Clean Power Plan in the context of Common but Differentiated Responsibility. This unit also introduces students to the idea that there are costs and benefits associated with the ...

Unit 4: Towards Climate Change Policy in the U.S. part of Regulating Carbon Emissions
This unit examines the social cost of carbon (introduced in Unit 3) within the legal doctrine of "common but differentiated responsibility" (CBDR). CBDR acknowledges global climate change as a common ...

Did Early Farmers Alter Climate? part of Teach the Earth:Teaching Activities
The overarching goal of this exercise is for students to explore the early anthropogenic hypothesis, which claims that early agriculture had a substantial impact on greenhouse gases and global climate thousands of ...

Quantum mechanics: Polar spectra part of PENGUIN:PENGUIN Modules
Students learn about the greenhouse effect by examining a "forbidden" rovibrational band in the infrared emission spectra of Earth's atmosphere, recorded from the surface at South Pole Station. By ...

Exploring the Global Carbon Budget part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
How much carbon is emitted each year due to human activity? How does that number compare to rates of exchange between carbon cycle reservoirs? Where do our carbon emissions go? In this module, students will explore global carbon budget data to 1) determine the rate of change in carbon emissions, 2) explore changes in carbon cycle sinks over time to investigate where carbon emissions end up, and 3) determine what kinds of rates of change are needed to reduce carbon emissions to zero in the future.

Tools and Methods in Environmental Science: Ice Cores part of PENGUIN:PENGUIN Modules
Students gain experience with tools and methods of Environmental science through exploring the paleoclimate record using ice cores as climate proxies. They learn what causes natural climate change and how it is ...

Global Warming in 5 Steps part of Oceanography:Activities
Scientists say the planet is warming because of human activities, namely the greenhouse effect from carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere when burning fossil fuels. But, how do we know? How do scientists know? ...

Atmospheric Carbon: Can We Offset the Increase? part of Oceanography:Activities
This activity lets students discover first hand how the big issues in climate change -- here, the increase in atmospheric CO2 and the utility of carbon offsets -- can be understood through measurement, application ...

A mock legislative debate to enhance and integrate student understanding of climate change science, policy, economics and ethics part of Integrate:Workshops and Webinars:Systems, Society, Sustainability and the Geosciences:Activities
This activity utilizes publicly available, proposed national legislation to provide a platform for student inquiry into the intersection of climate science, environmental economics and sustainable public policy.

An Experiential Pedagogy for Sustainability Ethics: The Externalities Game part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Games:Examples
The Externalities Game is a non-cooperative game that teaches students about the concept of environmental externalities and allows them to directly experience the moral dimensions of collective action problems. It ...

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 ...

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 Lifestyle Project part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Experience-Based Environmental Projects
This three-week project challenges students to learn about environmental alternatives by modifying their own lifestyles. Throughout the project, students reduce their impacts on the environment by changing the way in which they live from day to day.

Using a Mass Balance Model to Understand Carbon Dioxide and its Connection to Global Warming part of Quantitative Skills:Activity Collection
Students explore the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide over the past 40 years with an interactive on-line model.

The Modern Atmospheric CO2 Record part of Starting Point-Teaching Entry Level Geoscience:Teaching with Data:Examples
Students compare carbon dioxide (CO2) data from Mauna Loa Observatory, Barrow (Alaska), and the South Pole over the past 40 years to help them better understand what controls atmospheric CO2. -

Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Emissions at the County Level: A Collaborative Term Project to Enhance Understanding of Climate Modeling and Quantitative Reasoning part of Curriculum for the Bioregion:Activities
The general assignment is for the students to work as a team to quantify and map the variability in greenhouse gas emissions for the counties in Washington State. To accomplish this, students work in pairs ...