Polar Sciences Collection

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Polar Sciences

RESOURCE	GRADE LEVEL	MEDIA TYPE
Antarctica: A Challenging Work Day What happens when the ground under your feet is ice and it's moving? This video segment adapted from NOVA features some of the dangers faced by scientists conducting research in Antarctica.	3-12	Video
Antarctica: Sea Ice This video segment adapted from NOVA uses microwave images to reveal how sea ice doubles the size of Antarctica each winter. Rare footage shows how sea ice crushed the famous ship Endurance in 1914.	K-12	Video
Antarctic Ecosystem In contrast with its largely lifeless interior, the Antarctic coastal marine environment supports a vibrant and diverse ecosystem. Explore the region's living bounty in this interactive activity adapted from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.	5-12	Interactive
Antarctic Ice Movement: Part I This video segment adapted from NOVA explains why ice sheets move. To find out how fast they move, scientists carve a tunnel through a glacier.	6-12	Video
Antarctic Ice Movement: Part II Within Antarctic ice sheets are fast-moving streams of ice. This video segment adapted from NOVA hypothesizes about how ice streams are the result of warming at the end of the last ice age.	6-12	Video
Antarctic Ice: Sea Level Change What would happen if a portion of the Antarctic Ice Sheet were to melt? This video segment adapted from NOVA uses animations to show the effect of a 6-meter sea-level rise on coastal cities across the world.	6-12	Video
Arctic Atlas In this interactive atlas adapted from UNEP/GRID-Arendal, explore different environmental features of the Arctic. Select from a list of themes to customize your map, then zoom in to take a closer look at one of six featured regions.	6-12	Interactive
Arctic Climate Perspectives This video, adapted from material provided by the ECHO partners, describes how global climate change is affecting Barrow, Alaska.	6-9	Video
Arctic Ecosystem Despite seemingly inhospitable conditions, the Arctic environment has a vibrant and diverse ecosystem. Explore the life that thrives in this region in this interactive activity adapted from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.	5-12	Interactive
Arctic Sea Ice Satellite Observations In this interactive activity produced for Teachers' Domain, learn how Arctic sea ice has changed over the past 25 years in terms of maximum winter extent, concentration, and the timing of breakup each spring.	6-12	Interactive
Arctic Tundra This video segment from Wild Europe: "Wild Arctic" explores the struggle for survival in one of Earth's most extreme environments.	3-12	Video
Changing Arctic Landscape In this video adapted from the Arctic Athabaskan Council, learn how warmer temperatures in the Arctic are transforming the landscape, triggering a host of effects such as permafrost thawing and insect infestations.	6-12	Video
Climate Change This video segment adapted from NOVA explains the difference between weather and climate and features groundbreaking analysis revealing that Earth's climate has changed much faster than previously believed.	6-12	Video
Compare the Poles Explore the defining features of the Arctic and the Antarctic in this interactive activity adapted from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.	3-12	Interactive
Discovering Antarctica Take a guided tour of Antarctica by watching brief video segments of its landscape and wildlife in this interactive activity adapted from the British Antarctic Survey.	K-8	Interactive
Documenting Glacial Change This collection of comparative glacier images adapted from the National Snow and Ice Data Center shows substantial changes in five Alaskan glacier positions over periods of 60 to 100 years.	3-12	Interactive
Drilling to Antarctica’s Rock Core In this video adapted from ANDRILL, find out how geoscientists get through more than a dozen football fields of ice and water in order to study the rock and sediment beneath Antarctica.	3-8	Video
Earth as a System This visualization adapted from NASA maps progressive global changes onto a rotating globe. Earth's atmosphere, hydrosphere, geosphere, and biosphere are shown to be dynamic and interconnected.	6-12	Video
Earth’s Albedo and Global Warming In this interactive activity adapted from NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, learn about Earth's albedo (the ratio of reflected vs. incident solar radiation), how pollution alters albedo, and how ice-albedo feedback may accelerate global warming.	6-12	Interactive
Earth's Cryosphere: Antarctica Learn about the different features of snow and ice in Antarctica using satellite imagery in this video segment adapted from NASA.	6-12	Video
Earth's Cryosphere: The Arctic In this video segment adapted from NASA, take a tour of the cryosphere in North America and the Arctic using satellite imagery.	6-12	Video
Earth System: Ice and Global Warming This video segment adapted from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center explains ice's role in the Earth system, highlighting the delicate balance that could be upset with a continued rise in temperature due to climate change.	6-12	Video
Earth System: Satellites This video segment adapted from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center shows how integral satellites are to everyday life and describes the different types, including orbital and geostationary.	6-12	Video
Fastest Glacier In this video segment adapted from NOVA scienceNOW, scientists in western Greenland explain how a glacier there is shrinking and moving faster due to increased melting.	6-12	Video
Glaciers Featuring images of glacier formations, this interactive resource adapted from the National Park Service explains what glaciers are, where they are found, how they form, and how they move.	6-12	Interactive
Global Warming: Graphs Tell the Story Examine these graphs from the NOVA/ FRONTLINE Web site to see dramatic increases in the temperature of Earth's surface and greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.	6-12	Document
Global Warming Threatens Caribou This video segment adapted from Arctic Mission presents the challenges faced by caribou herds unable to adapt to a warming climate.	6-12	Video
Global Water Distribution How much water on Earth is fresh water? How much of that fresh water is found in icecaps? Lakes? Rivers? This interactive resource uses bar graphs to illustrate the relative distribution of fresh and salt water on Earth. Adapted from Oxford University Press.	3-12	Interactive
Great Ocean Conveyor Belt: Part I This image from GRID-Arendal depicts the major circulation pattern of the ocean, illustrating interactions between temperature, salinity, and depth.	9-12	Image
Great Ocean Conveyor Belt: Part II A substantial increase in freshwater running into the northern Atlantic Ocean could dramatically affect climate and global ocean currents. This audio segment from National Public Radio presents viewpoints from scientists studying changes in ocean circulation.	6-12	Audio
Greenland Ice Sheet Project 2: A Record of Climate Change Using images and graphs, this interactive resource illustrates scientists' efforts to study Earth's climatic history for the last 250,000 years by drilling into the Greenland Ice Sheet and examining ice cores. Adapted from the Wright Center for Science Education, Tufts University.	9-12	Interactive
How the Arctic Ecosystem Might Change In this video segment adapted from the National Film Board of Canada, learn why the unique Arctic ecosystem may be replaced if global warming continues to melt sea ice.	6-12	Video
Hunters Navigate Warming Arctic In this video segment adapted from the National Film Board of Canada, learn how the Inuit people have used their traditional knowledge to understand and adapt to changes in their Arctic environment, particularly when hunting and navigating the landscape.	6-12	Video
Ice Shelf and Ice Sheet Simulation In this interactive activity adapted from Texas A&M University, a block of melting ice simulates ice shelves and ice sheets and their differing effects on global sea level.	6-12	Interactive
Igloo 101 Learn what it takes to build an igloo—from the best kind of snow to the most effective tools—and other little-known facts about these traditional Canadian Inuit structures in this interactive activity from NOVA.	3-8	Interactive
Inuit Observations of Climate Change In this video adapted from the International Institute for Sustainable Development, an Inuit community collaborates with Western scientists studying climate change. Inuit observations are recorded and included in the data collection process, expanding the scientists' understanding of changes in the area.	6-12	Video
Melting Ice In this media-rich lesson, students explore the role that ice plays on Earth, the factors causing it to melt, and the local and global consequences of melting ice.	6-12	Lesson Plan
Mountain of Ice: If the Ice Melts This interactive resource adapted from NOVA Online features a collection of images that show what would happen to selected coastlines around the world if the Antarctic Ice Sheet melted.	6-12	Interactive
Observations of Climate Change In this media-rich self-paced lesson, students learn how data gathered through surveys with local residents and data collected by remote satellites are complementary tools that help deepen our understanding of the effects of climate change in the Arctic and elsewhere.	6-12	Self-paced Lesson
Observing Antarctica Take a unique trip through Antarctica in this interactive activity, adapted from NASA, which uses high-resolution satellite images from the Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica (LIMA).	6-12	Interactive
Penguin Response to Climate Change Find out how climate change is affecting Antarctic Adélie penguins and their ecosystem in this video segment adapted from Lloyd Fales and Sweetspot Pictures, Inc.	6-12	Video
Polar Bears and Climate Change In this video from the World Wildlife Fund, learn how rising temperatures in the southern Arctic could lead to polar bear extinction.	6-12	Video
Satellites Orbiting Earth This animation adapted from NASA shows the orbital paths of spacecraft in NASA's Earth Observing Fleet that are a source of wide-scale, primary research about Earth.	3-12	Video
Stories in the Ice Take a journey back through time, using ice cores to learn about the Earth's climatic history. From the FRONTLINE/NOVA: "What's Up with the Weather?" Web site	9-12	Document
Studying Antarctic Seals Learn firsthand from a young Antarctic researcher about a long-term study on the reproductive history of Weddell seals in this video segment adapted from WomenInAntarctica.com.	3-12	Video
Studying the Antarctic Sea Floor Studying life on the seafloor beneath Antarctica's thick ice is a major challenge for ecologists. Learn about a new device that can reach those icy depths in this video segment adapted from WomenInAntarctica.com.	6-12	Video
Taking the Earth's Temperature This video segment from FRONTLINE/NOVA: "What's Up with the Weather?" depicts research efforts to record Earth's past and present temperatures shifts.	9-12	Video
Tracking Polar Bears In this interactive activity adapted from the USGS Alaska Science Center, track the movements of a polar bear as it migrates across the changing Arctic sea ice and compare the paths of four different polar bears.	K-8	Interactive