The Thermohaline Circulation - The Great Ocean Conveyor Belt
Provided by: NASA |Published on: March 20, 2021
Articles/Websites
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Synopsis
This video and article explain thermohaline circulation, or the movement of cold surface water into the deeper parts of the ocean, which occurs near polar regions.
Students will also learn about the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, a current that flows around the Earth without encountering any land masses, allowing for thermohaline circulation.
The article does a good job of explaining thermohaline circulation.
The video presents a simple animation of the ocean currents that will help students to visualize thermohaline circulation.
Additional Prerequisites
Teachers may want to read the article with students before viewing the video because the video does not have any audio or text to describe the phenomenon.
Teachers may want to pause the animation at intervals to discuss what is happening in the visualization.
Differentiation
In advanced earth science classes, teachers could show the video to students without any context and ask them to form a hypothesis about what is happening.
Classes could discuss why the thermohaline circulation is likened to an ocean conveyor belt and the effect that the circulation has on ocean ecosystems.
