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Lesson 1- What about Carbon Dioxide?
Using different types of gases, students test for the presence and concentration of carbon dioxide levels. Using data from various sites around the world, students discuss the relationship between carbon dioxide and temperature. Students experiment with gases of different levels of carbon dioxide to determine the effects on temperature.
Lesson 2- Effects of Temperature on Organisms
Students measure the heart rate of zooplankton under different temperatures, and observe a demonstration of yeast respiration rates at different temperatures.
Lesson 3- Long Term Hudson River Temperature Changes
Over the last sixty years, temperature data from the Hudson River at Poughkeepsie has been collected on a monthly basis. The United States Historical Climatology Network data is freely available on the internet, and while this lesson plan uses the air temperature from Poughkeepsie as a companion data set, teachers should feel free to add other data sets from other locations around New York State using the website: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/monthly.html. Teachers can again decide whether students should practice using Excel to graph the data. Worksheets are provided for both options. Students are encouraged to think about broader ecosystem changes by viewing data from two fish species (Atlantic tomcod and rainbow smelt) as well as amphibian data.
Lesson 4- Climate Change Solutions Summit
Students have now spent some time thinking about the local impacts of climate change, and this lesson gives them a chance to think about the solutions on a global scale. Using the Climate Mitigation Initiative strategies from Princeton University, this lesson encourages groups of students to research specific ways to reduce CO2 emissions and then collaborate to determine the best global solutions. Included with these materials are a Carbon Footprint calculations worksheet and a list of ways to reduce personal carbon emissions, as well as a "Supermarket Hunt", which asks students to think about the emissions from food transport.
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