1. Electricity, Work, and Power part of Renewable Energy and Environmental Sustainability
This module is designed to prepare students to better understand the other modules in the course. It is a review of basic high school-level physics, reminding students of the fundamentals of energy, work, power, ...

Unit 5: Analyzing Complexity part of Systems Thinking
This unit has students build on a system diagram, to include new knowledge about quantitative values and relationships. They will also write about and discuss what they know about their systems, the questions that ...

Unit 1: Introduction to Systems Thinking – What is a System? part of Systems Thinking
This unit introduces systems and systems thinking. The unit is easily adaptable to any course and includes an introduction of terminology, motivation for using systems thinking, and practice reading, as well as ...

Unit 2: Picturing Complexity part of Systems Thinking
This unit includes an opportunity for students to move from definitions into reading and creating a diagram of a complex system relevant to their course, and then to exploring the connections between the components ...

Unit 3: Modeling a System part of Systems Thinking
This unit introduces systems modeling, which allows students to quantify and manipulate system components to create system responses. Students use a simple systems model of a bathtub to explore the effect of flow ...

Unit 4: Feedbacks in a System part of Systems Thinking
Feedbacks are a critical part of many systems. In this unit, students use a systems model to explore the effect of positive (reinforcing) and negative (balancing) feedbacks on system behavior. Model results are ...

Unit 4: Fossil Fuel Formation part of Carbon, Climate, and Energy Resources
Students will explore various aspects of fossil fuels by examining the various ranks of coal and the processes by which coal, oil, and natural gas form.

Unit 3: Geologic Record of Past Climate part of Carbon, Climate, and Energy Resources
Students will be introduced to a few of the different methods used in paleoclimatology, including isotopic ratios as paleotemperature proxies. They will investigate the greenhouse gas connections of two ancient ...

Unit 1: Identifying Misconceptions & Logical Fallacies part of Carbon, Climate, and Energy Resources
Students will identify how they, as individuals, think about climate science and explore common perceptions and misconceptions that exist about climate science. The activities within this unit incorporate ...

Unit 6: Moving Forward: Evaluating Impacts of Modern-day Proposals Affecting the Carbon-cycle and Climate part of Carbon, Climate, and Energy Resources
In this unit, students will review mock proposals that deal with some aspect of the role of carbon in the environment. Each proposal is based on actual actions proposed to mitigate some aspect of carbon consumption ...