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>
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).
Newsday reporter Jennifer Smith blogs dispatches from Toolik Lake, Alaska about science underway at the research station, including the work of researcher Amanda Koltz on predatory spiders.
In this one hour webinar, PolarTREC teacher Nick LaFave conducts live event for students and the public on his work at Toolik Field Station studying Predatory Spiders with researcher Amanda Koltz.
In this one hour webinar, PolarTREC teacher Nick LaFave conducts professional development for teachers on his work at Toolik Field Station studying Predatory Spiders with researcher Amanda Koltz.
Meet PhD student Amanda Koltz and learn about what motivated her to study science and research spiders in arctic food webs. Her fun fact might surprise you!
Environmental Science teacher Nick LaFave will put his hands-on teaching and researching skills into service while participating in a study of wolf spiders and their impact on the arctic environment. Read more about his upcoming PolarTREC expedition in this article from his community newspaper.
In this lesson students research scientific field expeditions and learn what it is like working in the field. Students are able to ask questions of the research team as part of their project. Students then share what they have learned with their classmates.
Objective
1. Students understand what really goes on in the field during a scientific study.
2
The U.S research community is conducting a deep ice coring project in West Antarctica for studies of climate, ice sheet history and cryobiology. This project is collecting a deep ice core from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) ice flow divide and integrating approximately 20 separate but synergistic projects to analyze the ice and interpret the records.
An important science skill that needs to be developed is asking significant questions that advance knowledge. This activity helps students to understand the difference between significant and trivial questions.
Objective
Students should be able to distinguish between significant questions that advance knowledge and trivial questions.
Procedure
1. Have the students define significant question and trivial questions in a