Equinox
Illustration of the Equinoxes.
Introducing the International Polar Week Collection a collection of resources that celebrate the Equinoxes. Starting in 2012, International Polar Week is celebrated twice a year, in March and in September. The Equinoxes are the only time when everywhere on earth the day length is 12 hours, a perfect opportunity to celebrate the poles on a global scale!

In celebration, several organizations have partnered together to host a variety of activities to connect and educate people about the polar regions. Learn more about the Polar Regions through this special collection of materials gathered to help celebrate this global event. These resources are FREE and will always be available, allowing you to access them at any time. In addition, every event will have a global activity, something that anyone and everyone can do! For more information on Polar Week, you can check out the APECS Polar Week page for all the events.

Here are the featured additions to the resource collection - submitted and reviewed by members of Polar Educators International:

The International Polar Week Collection was created with the help from researchers and educators that work in the polar regions and supported by the Association of Polar Early Career Scientists, the Arctic Research Consortium of the U.S., and Polar Educators International.

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Displaying 1 - 25 of 49

This PowerPoint presentation in Italian about polar antifreeze proteins was submitted as a capstone project by Laura Beltrami, a participant in the Cyber-based Interdisciplinary Science Education (C-ISE) Learning Course. This stand-alone presentation can be used to complement a Life Science lesson.

Presentation
Arctic
All Aged
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This one hour webinar is hosted by Polar Educators International for Polar Week - Fall 2012. Speakers are educators from the US and Canada sharing ideas for bringing polar science in classrooms. This webinar is for both educators and researchers.

Event
Arctic
About 1 period

This one hour webinar is part of the International Polar Week celebrations sponsored by APECS, ARCUS and PEI. The presenters are young scientists that work in the Polar Regions. They shared information about their work as well as how they became interested in polar science.

Event
Arctic
About 1 period

This one hour long event features researchers Karita Negandhi, Brittany Potter, John Lenters, and Reny Tyson. Karita has a marine biology background but currently studying Arctic thaw ponds, while Brittany and John study lakes in Barrow, Alaska and Reny studies humpback whales in Antarctica. This webinar is hosted by ARCUS and the Association for Polar Early Career Scientists (APECS) for

Event
Arctic
About 1 period

Teacher Notes

Students investigate the formation, physical and chemical properties of ice cores to determine the cause of a discrepant event.

Key Concept

Scientists analyze ice cores for evidence of climate history.

Background

This activity is based on known events: 1783's Laki volcano in Iceland, an "unknown" in 1810 and the Mount Tambora eruption in 1815.

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Lesson
Arctic
About a week
Middle School and Up
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Purpose

Glaciers are slow-moving masses of ice that exist where more snow falls than melts. They occupy about 10% of the Earth’s land, mostly in Greenland and Antarctica. Here, glaciers can be as much as 2 miles thick and weigh more than millions of tons. As they move, glaciers can widen and deepen valleys, flatten forests and grind boulders

Activity
Arctic
About 1 period
All Aged
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Purpose

To learn about the effects of air pollution on Sea Ice. This can be a library/computer lab-based activity.

Procedure

Teacher: 1. Mix up a 3.5% solution of NaCl. Make enough "sea-ice" cubes for each pair of students 2. Make another class set of ice cubes with tap water. Leave the ice in the freezer until after the

Activity
Arctic
Less than a week
Middle School and Up
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Purpose

To compare the conductivity of freshwater and seawater. This is a lab activity, and students should be taught appropriate safety measures, including eye protection and safety while using electricity.

Procedure

1. Use the table in attached PDF to record your data. 2. Put 100 mL of 3.5% NaCl solution into a 250 mL beaker. 3. Attach 2

Activity
Arctic
About 1 period
Middle School and Up
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Overview

Wilderness Research Foundation (USA) has developed two teaching modules based on a project we conducted in the Antarctic Peninsula in January 2010. They're available free for any educator interested in reviewing them for classroom use. The project concerned the collection of soil samples for the potential corroboration of a new conception of the carbon cycle. The principal investigator

Activity
Antarctic
Less than a week
Middle School and Up
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Overview

Wilderness Research Foundation (USA) has developed two teaching modules based on a project we conducted in the Antarctic Peninsula in January 2010. They're available free for any educator interested in reviewing them for classroom use. The project concerned the collection of soil samples for the potential corroboration of a new conception of the carbon cycle. The principal investigator

Activity
Antarctic
Less than a week
Middle School and Up
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Display at Macon County Library while my expedition is ongoing. Also includes a few hundred bookmarks with expedition address on it

Image
Arctic
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This is a one hour webinar event held in collaboration with APECS for Polar Week. On 22 March 2012 young scientists Jennifer Provencher and Piotr Angiel spoke with students about their work in polar science.

Event
Arctic
About 1 period

This is a one hour webinar event held in collaboration with APECS for Polar Week. On 20 March 2012 young scientists Meagan Grabowski and Piotr Angiel spoke with students about their work in polar science.

Event
Arctic
About 1 period

Explore this interactive animation showing the size of Antarctica relative to other continents and countries. This resource was developed by the Italian educational project in the context of ANDRILL (Antarctic Geological drilling) research. The site is in Italian but the animation can be used without knowledge of Italian.

Web Link
Antarctic
All Aged

Learn more about Polar Week and research on the southern continent through the website of the Italian National Museum (Museo Nazionale Antartide). Note: The website is in Italian.

Web Link
Antarctic
All Aged

This website is an English translation of some of the sections of the progettosmilla.it website, the Italian educational project of ANDRILL, an Antarctic International Scientific Research project. The site includes a blog from Antarctica, descriptions of ANDRILL research geared to students and teachers, multimedia and poster presentations, and links to other relevant resources. Some of the resources available here are

Web Link
Antarctic
Middle School and Up

This polar-themed unit plan provides a resource for teachers looking for ways to integrate a variety of challenging lessons and activities into their curriculum. The lessons touch on a variety of subject areas including language arts, math, and science. The unit is designed for a 3rd grade class but can be adapted for other grade levels. A helpful media list

Activity
Arctic
More than a week
Elementary and Up
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Sea ice, the thin layer of ice that covers most of the Arctic Ocean and surrounds most of the Antarctic continent, represents a distinctive feature of our planet. The attached flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, includes a summary of information about sea ice including sea ice formation, movement, monitoring, seasonal patterns, and forecasting. A follow-up

Activity
Arctic
About 1 period
All Aged
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People have lived in the Arctic for many millennia, developing skills, strategies, and community knowledge to survive polar conditions. The attached flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, summarizes some of the present issues of concern for residents of the Arctic, including issues of health, food security, community well-being, resource development, and place in the global economy

Activity
Arctic
About a week
All Aged
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The attached Polar Oceans flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, provides summary information about the Polar Oceans and describes how the circulation in polar waters exerts a powerful control on the Earth's climate and carbon cycle. Activities attached to the flyer demonstrate the interconnectedness of marine life in the oceans and how the Polar Regions affect

Activity
Arctic
Less than 1 period
All Aged
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The attached Lands and Life flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, includes a summary of terrestrial polar ecosystems, from southern cold maritime islands to dry continental deserts in Antarctica and from tree line across the continental tundra to remote northern islands in the Arctic. An attached activity allows students to build a small scale model of

Activity
Arctic
Less than 1 period
All Aged
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The attached Ice Sheets flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, includes a summary of information about ice sheets in both the Arctic and Antarctica, followed by an activity which allows students to make their own realistic model of an ice sheet with commonly available materials.

Activity
Arctic
Less than 1 period
All Aged
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The attached Changing Earth flyer, produced by the International Polar Year (IPY) Programme Office, includes a summary of the history of planet Earth and an activity involving the use of a rope as a timeline to represents the Earth’s history from the present to 65 million years ago.

Activity
Arctic
Less than 1 period
All Aged
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This detailed animation shows how the Earth is lit by the Sun throughout the year. The lighting of the Arctic and the Antarctic is detailed for every month of the year to help explain, among other things, the resulting polar night.

The animation is available in the following languages:

  • English: http://www.educapoles.org/multimedia/animation_detail/polar_nights/
  • Dutch: http://www.educapoles.org/nl/multimedia/animation_detail/de_poolnachten/
  • French: http://www.educapoles.org/fr/multimedia/animation_detail/la_nuit_dans_les_rgions_polaires/
Web Link
Arctic
Elementary and Up

ANDRILL (ANtarctic geological DRILLing) has drilled and recovered thousands of meters of rock core from beneath the McMurdo Ice Shelf in Antarctica. What secrets are hidden in this rock? Why do scientists from around the world work together to uncover these secrets that have been shrouded beneath the ice for millions of years? Join this real world geoscience adventure in

Web Link
Antarctic
All Aged