CLEAN: Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network
CLEAN: The Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network supports educators in building climate literacy as outlined in the U.S. Climate Change Science Program framework, “Essential Principles of Climate Literacy” by providing a collection of educational resources that facilitate learning about climate issues. The CLEAN collection is a free online database of ~1,000 free, peer-reviewed, and ready-to-use educational resources for teaching elementary, middle, high school, and undergraduate students about climate and energy. The collection contains activities, demonstrations, experiments, visualizations, and videos—everything you need to create data-rich and authentic lessons on climate and energy. Climate and energy topics include the climate system, causes of climate change, measuring and modeling climate, impacts of climate change, human responses and solutions to climate change, energy use, mental health, environmental justice, and many more. Resources are rigorously reviewed for scientific accuracy and pedagogic relevancy, making the CLEAN collection of high enough quality to steward the NOAA Teaching Climate database.
This video is one of a series from the Switch Energy project. …
This video is one of a series from the Switch Energy project. It presents pros and cons of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. In this video, new fracking technologies are presented as more economical and environmentally safe.
This interactive visualization created by FRED (Free Energy Data), displays energy supply …
This interactive visualization created by FRED (Free Energy Data), displays energy supply (by source) and demand (by use) for each state in the US from 1960 to 2010; forecasts through 2035 are available as well. FRED is an open platform to help state and local governments, energy planners and policy-makers, private industry, and others to effectively visualize, analyze, and compare energy-use data to make better energy decisions and form sustainable strategies.
In this classroom activity, students analyze regional energy usage data and their …
In this classroom activity, students analyze regional energy usage data and their own energy bills to gain an understanding of individual consumption, regional uses, costs, and sources of energy.
In this activity, students will use oxygen isotope values of two species …
In this activity, students will use oxygen isotope values of two species of modern coral to reconstruct ambient water temperature over a four-year period. They use Microsoft Excel, or similar application, to create a spreadsheet of temperature values calculated from the isotope values of the corals by means of an algebraic equation. Students then use correlation and regression techniques to determine whether isotope records can be considered to be good proxies for records of past temperatures.
This video documents how scientists, using marine algae, can study climate change …
This video documents how scientists, using marine algae, can study climate change in the past to help understand potential effects of climate change in the future.
This animated slideshow introduces biodiesel as a fuel alternative. With concern about …
This animated slideshow introduces biodiesel as a fuel alternative. With concern about the use of petroleum-based fuels at an all-time high, biodiesel is experiencing a popularity surge. And algaeâotherwise known to some as pond scumâ are grabbing headlines as the next potential biodiesel superstar. But how and why do algae make oil? And why do they make so much of it? In this audio slide show, U.C. Berkeley's Kris Niyogi describes the process and its potential.
This video montage of spectacular NASA satellite images set to music shows …
This video montage of spectacular NASA satellite images set to music shows different types of ice and ice features as well as descriptions of satellite-based measurements of ice cover. Text captioning describes how global ice cover is changing, and how this is measured.
This fuel cell animation demonstrates how a fuel cell uses hydrogen to …
This fuel cell animation demonstrates how a fuel cell uses hydrogen to produce electricity, with only water and heat as byproducts. The animation consists of four parts - an introduction, fuel cell components, chemical process, and fuel cell stack.
In this interactive simulation, students can explore global CO2 emissions displayed by …
In this interactive simulation, students can explore global CO2 emissions displayed by different continents/countries and plotted based on the GDP. A map view is also accessible.
In this activity, students learn about the energy sources used by their …
In this activity, students learn about the energy sources used by their local utility provider to generate electricity, and work in small groups to evaluate the sustainability of either a renewable or non-renewable energy source used to generate electricity.
This is a multi-media teaching tool to learn about climate change. The …
This is a multi-media teaching tool to learn about climate change. The tool is comprised of stills, video clips, graphic representations, and explanatory text about climate science. Acclaimed photographer James Balog and his Extreme Ice team put this teaching tool together.
This 15-panel interactive from NOVA Online describes some of the factors (such …
This 15-panel interactive from NOVA Online describes some of the factors (such as Earth's rotation and the sun's uneven heating of Earth's surface) contributing to the formation of the high-speed eastward flows of the jet streams, found near the top of the troposphere. These jet streams play a major role in guiding weather systems.
This short video shows an example of melting alpine glaciers in the …
This short video shows an example of melting alpine glaciers in the Austrian Alps (Goldberg Glacier). Disappearing alpine glaciers have social and environmental impacts, including the decline of fresh water supplies and contributions to sea level rise.
This activity engages learners in examining data pertaining to the disappearing glaciers …
This activity engages learners in examining data pertaining to the disappearing glaciers in Glacier National Park. After calculating percentage change of the number of glaciers from 1850 (150) to 1968 (50) and 2009 (26), students move on to the main glacier-monitoring content of the module--area vs. time data for the Grinnell Glacier, one of 26 glaciers that remain in the park. Using a second-order polynomial (quadratic function) fitted to the data, they extrapolate to estimate when there will be no Grinnell Glacier remaining (illustrating the relevance of the question mark in the title of the module).
In this activity, students compare two photographs (with time spans of 30-100 …
In this activity, students compare two photographs (with time spans of 30-100 years between photos) of specific Alaskan glaciers to observe how glaciers have changed over the time interval. Activity is a good kickoff for learning about glaciology - how and why glaciers form, grow and shrink, and their relation to climate change.
In this activity students work with data to analyze local and global …
In this activity students work with data to analyze local and global temperature anomaly data to look for warming trends. The activity focuses on the Great Lakes area.
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