CLEAN: Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network
CLEAN: The Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network supports educators in building climate literacy as outlined in the U.S. Climate Change Science Program framework, “Essential Principles of Climate Literacy” by providing a collection of educational resources that facilitate learning about climate issues. The CLEAN collection is a free online database of ~1,000 free, peer-reviewed, and ready-to-use educational resources for teaching elementary, middle, high school, and undergraduate students about climate and energy. The collection contains activities, demonstrations, experiments, visualizations, and videos—everything you need to create data-rich and authentic lessons on climate and energy. Climate and energy topics include the climate system, causes of climate change, measuring and modeling climate, impacts of climate change, human responses and solutions to climate change, energy use, mental health, environmental justice, and many more. Resources are rigorously reviewed for scientific accuracy and pedagogic relevancy, making the CLEAN collection of high enough quality to steward the NOAA Teaching Climate database.
This is a multi-media teaching tool to learn about climate change. The …
This is a multi-media teaching tool to learn about climate change. The tool is comprised of stills, video clips, graphic representations, and explanatory text about climate science. Acclaimed photographer James Balog and his Extreme Ice team put this teaching tool together.
This video is about Eunice Newton Foote, who studied the effect different …
This video is about Eunice Newton Foote, who studied the effect different gases have on the heat from the sun's rays. This is an engaging and funny video that describes the basis of climate science, while also discussing the hindering role of sexism in advancing science.
This 15-panel interactive from NOVA Online describes some of the factors (such …
This 15-panel interactive from NOVA Online describes some of the factors (such as Earth's rotation and the sun's uneven heating of Earth's surface) contributing to the formation of the high-speed eastward flows of the jet streams, found near the top of the troposphere. These jet streams play a major role in guiding weather systems.
This short video shows an example of melting alpine glaciers in the …
This short video shows an example of melting alpine glaciers in the Austrian Alps (Goldberg Glacier). Disappearing alpine glaciers have social and environmental impacts, including the decline of fresh water supplies and contributions to sea level rise.
This activity engages learners in examining data pertaining to the disappearing glaciers …
This activity engages learners in examining data pertaining to the disappearing glaciers in Glacier National Park. After calculating percentage change of the number of glaciers from 1850 (150) to 1968 (50) and 2009 (26), students move on to the main glacier-monitoring content of the module--area vs. time data for the Grinnell Glacier, one of 26 glaciers that remain in the park. Using a second-order polynomial (quadratic function) fitted to the data, they extrapolate to estimate when there will be no Grinnell Glacier remaining (illustrating the relevance of the question mark in the title of the module).
In this activity, students compare two photographs (with time spans of 30-100 …
In this activity, students compare two photographs (with time spans of 30-100 years between photos) of specific Alaskan glaciers to observe how glaciers have changed over the time interval. Activity is a good kickoff for learning about glaciology - how and why glaciers form, grow and shrink, and their relation to climate change.
In this activity students work with data to analyze local and global …
In this activity students work with data to analyze local and global temperature anomaly data to look for warming trends. The activity focuses on the Great Lakes area.
This simulation allows the user to project CO2 sources and sinks by …
This simulation allows the user to project CO2 sources and sinks by adjusting the points on a graph and then running the simulation to see projections for the impact on atmospheric CO2 and global temperatures.
This video features the Prairie Heating and CO2 Enrichment Experiment near Cheyenne …
This video features the Prairie Heating and CO2 Enrichment Experiment near Cheyenne WY, where scientists expose mixed-grass prairie to higher temperatures and CO2 concentrations to study impacts on the prairie for late in this century.
The activity follows a progression that examines the CO2 content of various …
The activity follows a progression that examines the CO2 content of various gases, explores the changes in the atmospheric levels of CO2 from 1958 to 2000 from the Mauna Loa Keeling curve, and the relationship between CO2 and temperature over the past 160,000 years. This provides a foundation for examining individuals' input of CO2 to the atmosphere and how to reduce it.
In this activity, students will practice the steps involved in a scientific …
In this activity, students will practice the steps involved in a scientific investigation as they learn why ice formations on land (and not those on water) will cause a rise in sea level upon melting. This is a discovery lesson on ice and water density and displacement of water.
This interactive displays how climate variables are changing over time (temperature, CO2, …
This interactive displays how climate variables are changing over time (temperature, CO2, Arctic sea ice, sun's energy, sea level, etc.) in graphical form. Students can easily examine over 50+ years of archived data.
In this activity, students estimate the drop in sea level during glacial …
In this activity, students estimate the drop in sea level during glacial maxima, when ice and snow in high latitudes and altitudes resulted in lower sea levels. Students estimate the surface area of the world's oceans, use ice volume data to approximate how much sea levels dropped, and determine the sea-level rise that would occur if the remaining ice melted.
A simple click-through animation from Scripps Institute's Earthguide program breaks the complex …
A simple click-through animation from Scripps Institute's Earthguide program breaks the complex topic of the global energy balance into separate concepts. Slides describe the different pathways for incoming and outgoing radiation.
In this activity, students analyze data detailing global energy sources and sinks …
In this activity, students analyze data detailing global energy sources and sinks (uses) and construct a diagram to show the relative scale and the connections between them. Discussions of scale; historical, socio-environmental, and geographic variation in this data; and implications for future energy use are included.
Global Forest Watch is an interactive, online forest monitoring and alert system …
Global Forest Watch is an interactive, online forest monitoring and alert system that provides users globally with the information they need to better manage and conserve forest landscapes.
With this simulation from the NASA Climate website, learners explore different examples …
With this simulation from the NASA Climate website, learners explore different examples of how ice is melting due to climate change in four places where large quantities of ice are found. The photo comparisons, graphs, animations, and especially the time lapse video clips of glaciers receding are astonishing and dramatic.
This is lesson five of a 9-lesson module. Activity explores the effects …
This is lesson five of a 9-lesson module. Activity explores the effects of climate change on different parts of the Earth system and on human well-being: polar regions, coral reefs, disease vectors, extreme weather, and biodiversity.
This activity supports educators in the use of the activities that accompany …
This activity supports educators in the use of the activities that accompany the GLOBE Program's Earth System Poster 'Exploring Connections in Year 2007'. Students identify global patterns and connections in environmental data that include soil moisture, insolation, surface temperature, cloud fraction, precipitation, world topography/bathymetry, aerosol optical thickness, and biosphere (from different times of the year) with the goal of recognizing patterns and trends in global data sets.
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