This lesson sequence guides students to learn about the geography and the unique characteristics of the Arctic, including vegetation, and people who live there. Students use Google Earth to explore the Arctic and learn about meteorological observations in the Arctic, including collecting their own data in hands-on experiments. This is the first part of a three-part curriculum about Arctic climate.

In this jigsaw activity, students explore meteorological data collected from Eureka, Canada to try to decide when would be the best time for an Arctic visit.

In this activity, students use authentic Arctic climate data to unravel some causes and effects related to the seasonal melting of the snowpack and to further understand albedo.

In this short video, host Dr. Ryan interviews graduate student Amy Steiker at the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research about her research, using isotopes of nitrous oxide, connecting human activity to greenhouse gas emissions.

Explore bending of light between two media with different indices of refraction. See how changing from air to water to glass changes the bending angle. Play with prisms of different shapes and make rainbows.

In this activity, students work with climate data from the tropical Pacific Ocean to understand how sea-surface temperature and atmospheric pressure affect precipitation in the tropical Pacific in a case study format.

In this activity, students examine climate variability in the North Atlantic associated with the North Atlantic Oscillation (NOA) in a case study format.

This video highlights a variety of climate change research initiatives from scientists at the University of Colorado, Boulder. It describes the changing dynamics of Antarctic ice sheets and the impacts of reduced Arctic sea ice. The video illustrates the excitement of this research through interviews and video clips of scientists in the field.

This video features CU Boulder Professor Jeff Mitton and his research team, who study the effects of mountain pine beetle infestations on the forest ecology in the Rocky Mountains. They explain the pine beetle life cycle and how they attack trees. An outlook into the future is also provided.

This is a STEM activity to learn how different colors absorb light better than others. Vocabulary and investigating questions are included to facilitate discussion, and a rubric is provided for assessment.

This pair of interactive visualizations allows students to explore basic and more complex concepts around heat conduction, heat capacity and energy transfer. The basic simulation demonstrates how heating and cooling iron, brick, water, and olive oil adds or removes energy from a system and transfers between objects. At the more advanced level, the systems simulation allows students to see that energy takes various forms, as well as how energy flows and changes from one form of energy into another.

An interactive simulation that allows the user to adjust mountain snowfall and temperature to see the glacier grow and shrink in response.

In this short video, atmospheric scientist Scott Denning gives a candid and entertaining explanation of how greenhouse gases in Earth's atmosphere warm our planet.

In this lesson, students analyze and synthesize data about how drought is measured, how scientists expect drought to change in the future, and how we can mitigate the impacts of drought in our communities.

In this lesson, students build an understanding of drought in Colorado through exploring case studies, authentic data, and online resources. After completing this lesson, students will be able to understand the basic causes and impacts of droughts, analyze a case study and current drought data in Colorado, and summarize the main preparedness steps and response strategies for drought events.

In this lesson, students analyze and synthesize data, and design local flood preparation strategies to answer the question, "What can we learn from past flood events to prepare for future floods?"

In this hazard lesson, students build an understanding of flooding in Colorado by exploring case studies, authentic data, and online resources. After completing this lesson, students will be able to understand the basic causes and impacts of floods, analyze case study and current flood data in Colorado, and summarize the main preparedness steps and response strategies for flood events.

In this lesson, students analyze and synthesize data, and design local wildfire preparation strategies to answer the question "What can we learn from past wildfires to prepare for future wildfires?"

In this lesson, students investigate wildfires in Colorado by analyzing wildfire data and information to create a local news story that educates community members about wildfire risk. In Part 1, students watch and discuss a short documentary about wildfires. In Part 2, students analyze wildfire data to build understanding of the causes, impacts, locations, and frequency of wildfires. In Part 3, students create a local news story for their community.

In this interactive game, students solve challenges that their community faces during the course of an extreme drought event by using available individual and community resources. Students work in three resilience teams to determine the strategies that they will invest in as a community as the drought situation evolves.