Teaching about the Ozone Hole

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's a good way to teach the Ozone Hole?

Part of a good of Science Teacher's Bag of Tricks is leading your students to the joy of making their own discoveries.

A lecture about the Ozone Hole is not near as engaging as an activity that lets you discover by yourself.

Here is the order of the Ozone Hole Lesson as I have taught it:

(1) Show a PowerPoint about the Ozone Hole along with a FollowSheet.

(2) Have your students color the Ozone Hole as it has changed over time with the Ozone Hole Activity.

(3) Here's a larger picture of the changes for you to project on your SmartBoard. Makes it easier to see while they are coloring.

(4) The most important part is to have them predict future changes in the Ozone Hole. Be sure to have them share their drawings and their reasoning behind their predictions. NOTE: They may make it smaller, making the assumption that we are making headway on reducing pollutants.



CONSIDER THIS: Add an Ozone Hole Activity to your bag of tricks!

FUN LINKS: Click here for a good tutorial on the Ozone Hole. Don't forget to explore YouTube! It's full of great educational clips, many from NASA and other sound educational institutions!

Teaching about Ocean Salinity

One of the first lessons for an Oceanography Unit should probably be the Salinity of the Ocean.



I loved to introduce this with the classic Egg Demonstration. It catches their interest! And gets the point across.

This can be done in many ways. Depends on how dramatic you are by nature. Do what makes you happy.

I would brag about how I could make an egg float and get all dramatic about it. Lots of razzle-dazzle while putting the egg in the (plain) water.

It would sink. I would look disappointed.

Then I would try another glass or beaker of water. More razzle-dazzle.

The egg would float!

Why? This starts a good guessing game - play Twenty Questions! - they will usually figure out there's something different about the second glass of water that makes it denser.

Once the idea of Salinity has been introduced, talk briefly about salty oceans and then do the Salinity Lab. This lab makes layers of color in test tubes. I would make a big deal about how if they did this lab CAREFULLY, they would get clear layers of color. If they had sloppy technique, they would get MUDDY colors. The room would be full of careful kids, which is always a abeautiful sight to see!

CONSIDER THIS: Introduce the concept of Salinity with the Egg Float Demo. Then move on to the Ranibow Salinity Lab.

FUN LINKS:
Click here for the Egg Float Lab.
Click here for the Egg Float FollowSheet for your students.
Click here for the Rainbow Salinity Lab.

Live Volcano WebCams

(Not a Live Cam shot, obviously!)

Bring live shots of Volcanoes into your classroom!

I've shown you some Flash Movies of Volcanoes from YouTube.

Now, check out LiveCams of Volcanoes! You might get lucky!

Click here for John Seach's list of Live WebCams. (John is a 20 year veteran volcanologist.)

CONSIDER THIS: Visit Live Volcano WebCams while teaching volcanoes. Even if you don't get lucky and see an eruption, it's still a thrill to see Mt. St. Helens LIVE!

Clouds PreTest

Here's a nice little PreTest you can give your students to see who knows what about CLOUDS.

Click here for the PreTest.

Here is a GREAT PowerPoint on CLOUDS! Click here. You don't even have to download this. Just go to this on your Smartboard and Voila!

WHAT FUN!

Tree Cookies

A wonderful way to teach how scientists determine Absolute Time is to have some Tree Cookie Activities.

Here are a collection of great activities to choose from. I would usually do the PowerPoint first and then do a simple "count the rings" lab. If I had time, I would do a cross-dating activity, which shows how dendochronologists string rings from many trees together to determine the climate of an area. Exploring the Methuselah Grove is a really nice way to calm them down after a couple of active activities. Give them a homework worksheet and they will do both things at the same time!

What fun! And real learning, too!

These are in the order I would do them over one or two days, with extras at the end.

1. Tree Cookies PowerPoint - fun way to introduce the whole concept of using trees to do some Absolute Dating. NOTE: I'm having problems with some of these images! Email me if you are, too. Can probably work something out.
2. The Stump - show your students how to count tree rings.
3. Be a Dendochronologist - good practice reading two different tree cookies
4. The Tree Cookie Lab Activity - Great lab. You need your own Tree Cookies for this lab, at least a couple dozen, preferably from several different trees - and if you must make your own, use downed trees, please! Try to find trees with different ring thicknesses and/or wounds.
5. The original Tree Ring Science Lesson - FABULOUS crossdating lesson - I used this idea for many years.
6. My version of the Tree Ring Activity - I've got it simplified and organized with a page to run off multiples of the "straws"
   
7. Interactive Tree Ring Activity - from NOVA - requires Shockwave -project onto your SmartBoard
8. Explore the Methusalah Grove - from NOVA - uses a QuickTime plug-in - beautiful 360 degree panoramic view of very old bristlecone pines - project onto your SmartBoard
9. Tree Cookie Game - not really a game but good practice for "reading" tree cookies
10. Tree Cookie Worksheet - basic identification of terms - might be good followsheet for PPT
11. Label Tree Ring Anatomy - from Enchanted Learning - also might be good PPT followsheet
12. How to Make Tree Cookies - good basic info for teachers - has a great section on what the different Special Features mean, such as thin rings, wide rings, scars, narrowing of rings on one side, etc.
13. YouTube has several videos on Reading Tree Rings; such as this one, which includes a visit to the Methusalah Bristlecone Pines. Search for Dendoclimatology or Reading Tree Rings.