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A resource from WGBH Boston: Ocean and Climate: Heat Redistribution

Lesson Plans for Popular Resources

 

 

Our Bringing the Universe to America's Classrooms resources, Earth and Space Science resources created in collaboration with NASA, have been used extensively during school Covid-19 closures, with over 243,000 users accessing the resources more than 842,000 times. Trusted content, curriculum alignment, engaging data-driven visualizations, and robust support materials are all reasons why they have been used so extensively for distance learning. Check out this lesson plan on heat distribution for grades 9-12:

 

 

 

Lesson Objective: Students will be able to relate the connections between unequal heating of Earth's surface and patterns of sea surface temperature, surface winds, and ocean density to ocean currents. They will communicate how the ocean redistributes heat around the planet by exploring data maps and visualizations. This lesson also comes with English Learner (EL) supports.

 

Time Allotment: Two 45-minute sessions

 

 

 

Media Gallery: Perpetual Ocean

Stimulate your students curiosity and interest about ocean circulation as well as its causes and mechanisms. They will view phenomena of ocean flows around the world from different perspectives through these visual depictions.

 

 

Interactive: Insolation on Earth

Students will learn about how the amount of solar energy reaching Earth's surface varies across the globe and through time. These maps from NASA show average monthly insolation over the course of a year.

 

 

Interactive Lesson:

North Atlantic Ocean Circulation

In this interactive lesson, students can explore the ocean's role in redistributing the Sun's energy on Earth. Through NASA data visualizations, they can investigate how various factors interact in the transport of heat.

 

 

 

Handout

EL Support: Vocabulary

NV Support: An Early Observation of the Deep Ocean

 

 

 

This activity is funded by NASA under cooperative agreement award No. NNX16AD71A. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

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