This lesson plan is designed to teach students about the importance of the benthic community in the shallow portions of the Arctic and how climate change may affect their respiration. One of the dominant benthic animals in the Arctic, the bivalve Macoma sp., is an important food source for higher trophic level organisms such as walrus and Spectacled Eiders
This lesson plan is designed to teach students about benthic biodiversity in the Arctic by analyzing data from the Distributed Biological Observatory (DBO). Although you can’t see them from the surface, the organisms found on the ocean floor are important indicators of ecosystem health and provide information about productivity. Students will explore sites throughout the Bering and Chukchi Seas
PolarTREC (Teachers and Researchers Exploring and Collaborating) is a professional development program that pairs K-12 teachers in the United States with polar researchers. Teachers engage in field research and develop long-term relationships with scientists in order to better understand the scientific process and implement the skills and knowledge they have gained into the classroom. The goal
Article from a local Dover, New Hampshire news outlet about Piper Bartlett-Browne's expedition aboard the USCGC Healy for the Northern Chukchi Integrated Study expedition.
PolarTREC teacher Emily Dodson participated in a scientific expedition in the summer of 2014 at Kangerlussuaq, Greenland. Emily’s book is a telling of the science story behind the teams work and Emily’s participation as an educator and field assistant on the PolarTREC expedition.
Author/Credit
To contact Emily <emily.snowden [at] fayette.kyschools.us>
Soil decomposers, such as some bacteria and fungi, obtain energy needed for life from dead and decomposing plant and animal remains, known as soil organic matter. Soil organic matter is important to local ecosystems because it affects soil structure, regulates soil moisture and temperature, and provides energy and nutrients to soil organisms. It is also important globally, because
Emily Dodson-Snowden, a sixth-grade science teacher at Morton Middle School, didn’t have a typical summer break. She spent three weeks in Greenland studying how climate change influences plant/pollinator interactions and plant reproduction as part of PolarTREC (Teachers and Researchers Exploring and Collaborating).
Just as the increase in atmospheric CO2 is causing the global air temperture to rise, the container with the added CO2 will trap more heat inside and will show a higher internal temperature.
Overview
This activity/demonstration can be used directly following lessons on greenhouse gasses and their effects on warming the atmosphere by allowing shortwave UV energy
Dayton's News Program, Fox 45 in the Morning, talks with teacher Chantelle Rose directly from the Arctic about her oceanographic PolarTREC expedition and follow-up involvement with the 2012 Arctic Ocean Ecosystem Workshop in Barrow, Alaska.
Students decorate polysterene cups later to be submerged in the ocean. Subsequent activities have students consider the effects of water pressure and depth with respect to their cups.
Objective
Students will determine mass and volume of a styrofoam cup. They will calculate the density and research the depth of the Bering, Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. They will