• This lesson plan teaches students the distinctions between energy and electricity and improves their data analysis skills. 
• Students will explore graphs of data on the United States' generation and consumption of electricity and energy to help further differentiate the terms and to evaluate climate solutions. 

Positives

• The student pages include a glossary of energy sources and if each is considered low CO₂  or renewable. 
• The Educator Guide includes student objectives, standards, skills addressed, what students should already know, a table of contents with time stamps, and other helpful information to effectively teach the lesson.
• Students make future predictions based on the data.

Additional Prerequisites

• Teachers can download the full Educator Guide as a PDF at the top of the page.
• Teachers can scroll down to separately download the teacher pages, student pages, and tips for using the Educator Guide.

Differentiation

• Try assigning the podcast as homework, as it directly addresses misconceptions around using energy and electricity interchangeably, while the worksheet dives deeper into the data on electricity and energy and can be completed during class in groups.
  
• Before teaching the lesson, students can make a prediction about the difference between electricity and energy, and then update their responses after the lesson or podcast.
• Students can identify which sectors produce the most CO₂ and propose policies for the United States based on the graphs they explore in the lesson.
• Other resources related to these topics include this lesson on the electric grid as it relates to climate change, this interactive map on global access to electricity, and this video on the amount of clean electricity needed to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.

This resource addresses the listed standards. To fully meet standards, search for more related resources.