This video is about the effects that ocean acidification has on the ocean ecosystem and food web.
Students will learn about the causes of ocean acidification, the pH scale, the rate of change in ocean pH levels over time, and ways biodiversity is impacted by these changes.
Teaching Tips
Positives
It uses principles of chemistry to explain the connections between burning fossil fuels, ocean acidification, and decreased biodiversity in the ocean food web.
It includes a transcript of the video with timestamps and a read-along feature for students who need support following along.
Additional Prerequisites
Students should have some baseline knowledge of chemical reactions.
Students should know about food webs and phytoplankton's role in the ocean food web.
Differentiation
Students in science classes could design and simulate the experiment presented at 8:53 in the video.
Math classes could use this resource as a real-world example of data that is measured using the log scale.
This resource can be directly assigned to Google Classroom if you sign up for a free account.
There is a direct link between the burning of fossil fuels and decreased biodiversity in the oceans. This video uses the principles of chemistry to explain this linkage. This resource is recommended for teaching.
Standards
Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)
ESS2: Earth's Systems
HS-ESS2-2 Analyze geoscience data to make the claim that one change to Earth’s surface can create feedbacks that cause changes to other Earth systems.
LS2: Ecosystems: Interactions, Energy, and Dynamics
HS-LS2-2 Use mathematical representations to support and revise explanations based on evidence about factors affecting biodiversity and populations in ecosystems of different scales.
HS-LS2-4 Use mathematical representations to support claims for the cycling of matter and flow of energy among organisms in an ecosystem.
HS-LS2-6 Evaluate the claims, evidence, and reasoning that the complex interactions in ecosystems maintain relatively consistent numbers and types of organisms in stable conditions, but changing conditions may result in a new ecosystem.
