Climate Change and the Oceans

Positives:

• This lesson uses interactive learning tools, graphs, maps, and photographs to help students understand the connections between the oceans and the climate.

• The lesson includes a pop-up glossary to assist students in accessing definitions.
• The lesson is divided into five sections. 

Additional Prerequisites

• This is part 8 of 9 in Explaining Climate Change, a series of lessons from The King's Centre for Visualization in Science.
• This resource provides some advanced math and chemistry examples that may be challenging for some students.
• Some of the data is not current. Teachers may want to note the following:
  • The Ocean Trends learning tool only has data from 2010.
  • Page 2/4 in Key Idea 4: The Oceans' Carbon Cycle and Carbon Speciation features maps from the 1990s.
  • Page 3/5 in Key Idea 5: Immeasurable Importance refers to severe flooding in Bangladesh in 1998.

Differentiation

• Cross-curricular connections could be made with geography, history, and social studies using the topics of climate migration, changing landscapes, and shipping routes.
  
• Teachers could use some of the Lesson 8 Questions, which appear at the end of the lesson, as science journal prompts, small group discussion questions, or quiz questions to check for understanding.