Amazing Albedo

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Description

This lesson is a lab in which students use thermometers, white and dark paper, and lamps to measure differences in albedo between the light and dark materials. Connections are made to albedo in Antarctica.

Analyze and interpret data to provide evidence for phenomena.

Analyze data using tools, technologies, and/or models (e.g., computational, mathematical) in order to make valid and reliable scientific claims or determine an optimal design solution.

Ask questions to determine relationships between independent and dependent variables and relationships in models.

Ask questions to determine relationships, including quantitative relationships, between independent and dependent variables.

Construct an explanation that includes qualitative or quantitative relationships between variables that predict(s) and/or describe(s) phenomena.

Construct and revise an explanation based on valid and reliable evidence obtained from a variety of sources (including students’ own investigations, models, theories, simulations, peer review) and the assumption that theories and laws that describe the natural world operate today as they did in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

Apply scientific reasoning, theory, and/or models to link evidence to the claims to assess the extent to which the reasoning and data support the explanation or conclusion.

Construct, use, and/or present an oral and written argument supported by empirical evidence and scientific reasoning to support or refute an explanation or a model for a phenomenon or a solution to a problem.

Develop or modify a model—based on evidence – to match what happens if a variable or component of a system is changed.

Develop and/or use a model (including mathematical and computational) to generate data to support explanations, predict phenomena, analyze systems, and/or solve problems.

Evaluate data, hypotheses, and/or conclusions in scientific and technical texts in light of competing information or accounts.

Conduct an investigation and/or evaluate and/or revise the experimental design to produce data to serve as the basis for evidence that meet the goals of the investigation.

Make directional hypotheses that specify what happens to a dependent variable when an independent variable is manipulated.

The foundation for Earth’s global climate systems is the electromagnetic radiation from the sun, as well as its reflection, absorption, storage, and redistribution among the atmosphere, ocean, and land systems, and this energy’s re-radiation into space.

Weather and climate are influenced by interactions involving sunlight, the ocean, the atmosphere, ice, landforms, and living things. These interactions vary with latitude, altitude, and local and regional geography, all of which can affect oceanic and atmospheric flow patterns.

Cause and effect relationships can be suggested and predicted for complex natural and human designed systems by examining what is known about smaller scale mechanisms within the system.

Models (e.g., physical, mathematical, computer models) can be used to simulate systems and interactions—including energy, matter, and information flows—within and between systems at different scales.

Feedback (negative or positive) can stabilize or destabilize a system.

Time, space, and energy phenomena can be observed at various scales using models to study systems that are too large or too small.

The transfer of energy can be tracked as energy flows through a designed or natural system.

Empirical evidence is needed to identify patterns.

Models can be used to represent systems and their interactions—such as inputs, processes and outputs—and energy and matter flows within systems.

Graphs, charts, and images can be used to identify patterns in data.

Small changes in one part of a system might cause large changes in another part.