This lesson focuses on adaptations as a driving force in evolutionary diversity. Adaptations are characteristics within a species that enhance its chances of survival and reproduction. Adaptations can be behavioral, structural, or functional. Students must understand that these adaptations are not acquired in the course of the organism’s lifetime, but are inherited traits that have been passed down
This National Science Foundation Press Release details how PolarTREC teacher Paula Dell's students designed and built their own underwater camera rig to observe and record Antarctic Fish. Their device was successfully deployed this year in the waters off Antarctica.
PolarTREC teacher Paula Dell accompanied researcher Kristin O’Brien’s team to Palmer Station in Antarctica for two
months in 2011 to conduct research on antarctic fishes. This article describes their expedition, their evolving collaboration and includes interviews with both Paula Dell and PolarTREC project manager, Janet Warburton.
Online newspaper from Massillon, Ohio interviews teacher Deanna Wheeler about her second PolarTREC expedition to the Arctic and describes how her students have become directly involved in arctic studies.
This press release in the Bayonet online newspaper from Maryland outlines teacher Deanna Wheeler's second "educational experience of a lifetime" in the Arctic with PolarTREC.
Follow the Polar Expedition is a booklet designed for students to help them learn about the 2012 Chukchi Sea Offshort Monitoring in the Drilling Area (COMIDA) Hanna Shoal Ecosystem Study with PolarTREC teacher Deanna Wheeler. The expedition is August 5-25, 2012, aboard the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter.
The booklet has terms used on the ship as well as several activities
What happens to the salinity in the Bering Sea during ice and no ice conditions? Does it change throughout the year and at different depths during different seasons? Create a model of the Bering Sea in ice conditions. Change the conditions based on seasonal changes to explore the effects of runoff on salinity.
Students will undertake a long term project to evaluate the effectiveness of different local forecasters, match the forecast with the actual weather and analyze which forecaster is best.
Objective
Students will compare the accuracy of different weather forecasts. Students will compile and analyze their own data gaining a better understanding of the challenges involved in weather forecasting
This article highlights climate change research on board the USCGC Healy in the spring of 2009 with interest in the role of Deanna Wheeler, PolarTREC teacher on board the ship. There are also short videos embedded within the article.
Students use data and pictures of a destroyed wind sensor, to develop a theory of what happened to the station. They then develop a plan to make sure the station is not destroyed again.
Objective
Students will be able to use data to develop a reasonable hypothesis.