Why fly south? How climate change alters the phenology of plants and animals

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This activity introduces students to plotting and analyzing phenology data. Students use 30 years of data that shows the date of the first lilac bloom and the number of days of ice cover of nearby Gull Lake.

HS-LS2-2 Use mathematical representations to support and revise explanations based on evidence about factors affecting biodiversity and populations in ecosystems of different scales.

HS-ESS2-7 Construct an argument based on evidence about the simultaneous coevolution of Earth’s systems and life on Earth.

MS-LS2-4 Construct an argument supported by empirical evidence that changes to physical or biological components of an ecosystem affect populations.

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.

Apply concepts of statistics and probability (including determining function fits to data, slope, intercept, and correlation coefficient for linear fits) to scientific and engineering questions and problems, using digital tools when feasible.

Ask questions that arise from careful observation of phenomena, models, or unexpected results, to clarify and/or seek additional information.

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

Make a quantitative and/or qualitative claim regarding the relationship between dependent and independent variables.

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 ideas, principles, and/or evidence to provide an explanation of phenomena and solve design problems, taking into account possible unanticipated effects.

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.

Critically read scientific literature adapted for classroom use to determine the central ideas or conclusions and/or to obtain scientific and/or technical information to summarize complex evidence, concepts, processes, or information presented in a text by paraphrasing them in simpler but still accurate terms.

Use digital tools (e.g., computers) to analyze very large data sets for patterns and trends.

Apply mathematical concepts and/or processes (such as ratio, rate, percent, basic operations, and simple algebra) to scientific and engineering questions and problems.

Create and/or revise a computational model or simulation of a phenomenon, designed device, process, or system.

Use mathematical, computational, and/or algorithmic representations of phenomena or design solutions to describe and/or support claims and/or explanations.

Use simple limit cases to test mathematical expressions, computer programs, algorithms, or simulations of a process or system to see if a model “makes sense” by comparing the outcomes with what is known about the real world.

Develop and/or use a model to predict and/or describe phenomena.

Develop and/or use a model to generate data to test ideas about phenomena in natural or designed systems, including those representing inputs and outputs, and those at unobservable scales.

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

Critically read scientific texts adapted for classroom use to determine the central ideas and/or obtain scientific and/or technical information to describe patterns in and/or evidence about the natural and designed world(s).

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

The many dynamic and delicate feedbacks between the biosphere and other Earth systems cause a continual co-evolution of Earth’s surface and the life that exists on it.

Organisms, and populations of organisms, are dependent on their environmental interactions both with other living things and with nonliving factors.

Ecosystems are dynamic in nature; their characteristics can vary over time. Disruptions to any physical or biological component of an ecosystem can lead to shifts in all its populations.

Changes in the physical environment, whether naturally occurring or human induced, have thus contributed to the expansion of some species, the emergence of new distinct species as populations diverge under different conditions, and the decline–and sometimes the extinction–of some species.

Empirical evidence is required to differentiate between cause and correlation and make claims about specific causes and effects.

Much of science deals with constructing explanations of how things change and how they remain stable.

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.

Cause and effect relationships may be used to predict phenomena in natural or designed systems.

Energy drives the cycling of matter within and between systems.

Algebraic thinking is used to examine scientific data and predict the effect of a change in one variable on another (e.g., linear growth vs. exponential growth).

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.

Change and rates of change can be quantified and modeled over very short or very long periods of time. Some system changes are irreversible.

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

Stability might be disturbed either by sudden events or gradual changes that accumulate over time.

Patterns in rates of change and other numerical relationships can provide information about natural systems.

Explanations of stability and change in natural or designed systems can be constructed by examining the changes over time and processes at different scales, including the atomic scale.

The observed function of natural and designed systems may change with scale.

Scientific relationships can be represented through the use of algebraic expressions and equations.

Why fly south? How climate change alters the phenology of plants and animals

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Science and Engineering Practices

Disciplinary Core Ideas

Crosscutting Concepts