Paleoclimate of the last 2k years part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Paleoclimate data provide essential information about Earth's temperature prior to the instrumental record. These data give us context for recent anthropogenic (human-caused) warming; they provide insight into ...

Distribution and Fate of Volatile Organic Contaminants (VOCs) part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Volatile organic contaminants (VOCs) are organic compounds generated from different industrial processes around the world. VOCs are ubiquitous contaminants, and some can be genotoxic, mutagenic and act as endocrine disruptors, thus representing a risk to ecosystems and human health. High levels of VOCs have been reported in industrialized countries such as the US. In this module, students will explore how the distribution of VOCs has changed over time. Students will then compare types and concentrations of VOCs among the US states in the context of geography, urbanization, industrialization, and fossil emissions as contributing factors of air pollution.

Environmental Pollution & Public Health part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Environmental health is a field of study within public health that is concerned with human-environment interactions, and specifically, how the environment influences public well-being. In this module, students will explore how environmental pollution impacts public health through comparing cancer rates of areas with known environmental pollutants to the national average through a t-test. Students can further their knowledge by comparing the concentrations of atmospheric pollutants in areas with known sources to control sites without such sources. Project EDDIE modules are designed with an A-B-C structure to make them flexible and adaptable to a range of student levels and course structures.

Climate Drivers of Phenology part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Many species' life cycles are strongly influenced by temperature, but other cues, like day length and precipitation, can also trigger life cycle changes. Phenology is a way of recording the time when events, ...

Phenology Trends and Climate Change in Minnesota part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Seasonal events, for example flowering, fruiting, and the return of migrating birds, happen at particular times of the year. Some of these events happen in relation to climate, while others are dependent on other ...

Lake Ice Phenology Module part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Lakes are changing worldwide due to altered climate. Many lakes that were historically frozen in the winter are now experiencing fewer days of ice cover and earlier ice-off dates. In this module, students will ...

Biodiversity part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
In this module, students will analyze data from the Florida Keys Reef Visual Census (FKRVS), a long-term monitoring effort of key reef fish populations in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. Students will calculate the species richness as well as the Shannon index and Pielou's evenness index across different years of data and between different reef types. Furthermore, students will explore how years with high frequencies of hurricanes impact these measures. The module culminates with students writing a summary finding of how reef types and hurricane frequency will impact the FKRVS in the future.

Hypoxia in Coastal Marine Ecosystems part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Aquatic ecosystems are home to a complex intersection of physical and biological factors and an intersection of natural and anthropogenic factors. In the Chesapeake Bay, low oxygen events have occurred periodically ...

Spectral Seismology Module part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
This module that is based on a conceptual presentation of waveforms and filters. "Spectral Seismology" will engage students using seismic and acoustic signals available through Incorporated Research ...

Biomes, Vegetation Structure, and Canopy Height part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Students will develop a concept of vegetation structure and biomes through an exploration of field site data from the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) project. Students will compare characteristics of major groups of plants with respect to heat and drought tolerance, develop hypotheses for how canopy height may vary by several abiotic factors, and evaluate their hypotheses using graphed data, trendlines and r-squared values.

Paleoclimate part of IODP School of Rock 2020:Teaching Activities
This is a unit plan for project-based learning. Students will learn about paleoclimate proxies and their importance in understanding past climates. Students will focus on one region-specific aspect of paleoclimate ...

Investigating Bacterial Contamination in Snapfinger Creek part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Water quality is a global concern for natural and potable water sources. Lack of access to clean water due to poor sanitation can lead to microbial disease outbreaks, such as cholera, that can cause serious ...

Lake Metabolism Module part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Different lakes exhibit a range of catchment sizes, morphometry, and land use that contribute to differences in lake function. These functional differences mean that lakes vary in ecosystem services such as habitat ...

Stream Discharge Module part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Stream discharge is a fundamental measure of water supply in stream systems. Low discharge may cause problems with water supply and fish passage, while high discharge may mean flooding. In this module, students ...

Major Ions in Freshwater Systems part of Project EDDIE:Teaching Materials:Modules
Dissolved ions are present in all freshwater systems, but humans can change the chemical composition of freshwater in several ways. In this activity, students will examine the concentration of major ions in ...

Module 7: Mammal Responses to Climate Change in the Past and the Future with Neotoma Explorer part of Neotoma:Teaching Activities
Animal distributions are frequently controlled by climate extremes, especially seasonal ones. Therefore, if the climate changes from cold to warm (or vice versa) then using modern mammal distributions and modern climate conditions it is possible to make predictions about how the mammal will respond to the climate change -- whether it is past or future. In this module students use the Neotoma Paleoecological Database to test predictions, or establish hypotheses, about how certain species of mammals have responded to climate change in the past and how they might do so on the future. Part of the Neotoma Education Modules for Biotic Response to Climate Change.

Module 6: Modern (Living) Animals – What Do the Habitat Preferences and Geographic Distribution of Modern Animals Tell Us about Why Animals Live Where They Do? part of Neotoma:Teaching Activities
Paleoecologists reconstruct past climates and ecosystems by comparing the habits and habitats preferred by living animals or ones closely related to those found as fossils. In this module, students take the first step in this process by examining modern species distributions to make observations about species habitat preferences. Given a list of species, students use the Neotoma Explorer to obtain species distribution maps and compare them to temperature and precipitation maps. A series of questions guide them through their comparison and analysis of the maps. Part of the Neotoma Education Modules for Biotic Response to Climate Change.

Module 5: Some Modern Biotic Responses to Climate Change part of Neotoma:Teaching Activities
In this module, students explore biotic responses to changing climate. The module steps through different styles of response (i.e. stasis, adaptation, extinction) and provides examples of each from modern biota. Students are given a set of exercises where they create a hypothesis for future mammal distribution changes. Part of the Neotoma Education Modules for Biotic Response to Climate Change.

Module 2: Ecology and Paleoecology Principles part of Neotoma:Teaching Activities
In this two part activity, students are introduced to the principals of ecology and paleoecology and compare modern ecological relationships with prehistoric ones. In part one, students read about ecological principles such as ecological niches and competitive exclusion, and how these principles can be applied to modern and past organisms. Students answer a series of questions that ask them to apply their knowledge of ecological principles. In the second part, students are introduced to non-analogue biotas and complete a set of exercises using the Neotoma Explorer. Part of the Neotoma Education Modules for Biotic Response to Climate Change.

The Pangea Puzzle part of Introductory Courses:Activities
Students learn how to use the Paleobiology Database (PBDB) to produce maps of fossils on the present-day Earth's surface, as well as past continental configurations. They will then use these maps to understand ...