This easy-to-follow reference guide helps students comprehend various climate change topics, such as greenhouse gasses, sea level rise, and the difference between weather and climate.
Students will learn the answers to basic climate change questions and investigate further using linked videos, articles, and graphics.
Teaching Tips
Positives
Each climate change question and short answer also has a link to a more in-depth explanation, including a mixture of videos, animated graphics, and colorful visuals.
Each of the ten questions, answers, and related links can be a stand-alone lesson, so teachers can create a two-week unit using this website.
Additional Prerequisites
Teachers can download this resource as a PDF.
The link for NASA citizen science projects does not work on the PDF, only on the webpage.
Teachers and students will need internet access.
Some of the links lead to the same resource.
Differentiation
There are ten climate change questions and answers with linked resources, so English teachers can assign small-group research projects and have students give verbal presentations to fulfill the speaking and listening standards.
Teachers can strategically assign the topics with a video and less text for auditory learners and assign the more text-heavy ones to students with a lot of reading stamina and visual learners.
There are links to extension resources such as climate change games, videos, hands-on activities, and green career interviews.
Scientist Notes
This resource is an all-inclusive manual for taking climate action. It would support young people to discover fresh perspectives on environmental sustainability and conservation.
Standards
Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)
ESS2: Earth's Systems
5-ESS2-1 Develop a model using an example to describe ways the geosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and/or atmosphere interact.
ESS3: Earth and Human Activity
MS-ESS3-5 Ask questions to clarify evidence of the factors that have caused the rise in global temperatures over the past century.
4-ESS3-1 Obtain and combine information to describe that energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and that their uses affect the environment.
Common Core English Language Arts Standards (CCSS.ELA)
Reading: Informational Text (K-12)
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.3.1 Ask and answer questions to demonstrate understanding of a text, referring explicitly to the text as the basis for the answers.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.4.4 Determine the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words or phrases in a text relevant to a grade 4 topic or subject area.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.5.7 Draw on information from multiple print or digital sources, demonstrating the ability to locate an answer to a question quickly or to solve a problem efficiently.
Speaking & Listening (K-12)
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.7.2 Analyze the main ideas and supporting details presented in diverse media and formats (e.g., visually, quantitatively, orally) and explain how the ideas clarify a topic, text, or issue under study.
