In a “March Madness” game of survival of the fittest, will your microbe and its genes survive the test of changing conditions on Planet Earth and beyond? Students choose genes from a “toolbox” and pit their microbe against their classmates’, using critical thinking and argument writing to determine the microbe with the best chance of success. Based on PolarTREC
Analogs are used in science investigations to better understand systems we can’t access ourselves. In this lesson, students explore the Dry Valleys of Antarctica to better understand microbial communities on early Earth and what might have been possible on ancient Mars. Students will examine photographs, written descriptions, and artistic renderings of early Earth, the Dry Valley lakes, and
The report is written by teacher participants upon return from their field expedition portion of the PolarTREC program. It summarizes the benefit of the expedition to the teacher, a description of activities, and a summary of how teachers plan to link this experience in classrooms and communities. This is a public document that will be posted in teacher portfolios and
In this introductory lesson, students read an article about Arctic Ocean ecosystems and then play a board game in which they take on the role of researchers.
Objectives
The purpose of this introductory activity is to:
* Identify the main components of complex arctic ecosystem and describe predator/prey relationships between phytoplankton, ice algae, zooplankton, bowhead whales, polar
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.
Article about Michele Cross's upcoming PolarTREC Expedition with Stacy Kim and the SCINI ROV team in Antarctica. Ms. Kingsley encourages others to follow the expedition online and through the newspaper, as she hopes to post updates throughout the expedition.
We go places, but what do we do with the billions of snippets of information we absorb? How do we process the information so that it means something to us when we can no longer be there? As a geographer, my objective was to be able to observe, participate and categorize the billions of pieces of visual information