CLIMATE SCIENCE INVESTIGATIONS (CSI): SOUTH FLORIDA USING NASA DATA TO IMPROVE YOUNG ADULTS' CLIMATE AND SCIENCE LITERACY

Climate Science Investigations (CSI): South Florida is an online, interactive series of modules that are currently under development. The objective of CSI: South Florida is to develop and pilot six modules that enable high school and undergraduate students to analyze and use data to address the public’s questions and commonly held misconceptions about climate change.

The instructional approach is not simply to teach students the answers to common questions about climate change, but to use the questions themselves and the arguments that underlie them as a basis for teaching the practices of science and the processes that underlie climate science.

In the first module, students are introduced to climate science inquiry and the practices and nature of science. They examine extreme weather events and review Earth’s energy balance (which is fundamental to understanding an enhanced greenhouse effect and climate science). In the second module, students investigate the temporal and spatial temperature data to answer the question of whether Earth is warming. In the third module, students investigate the variety of observations that indicate Earth has warmed (e.g., melting ice and rising sea level). In the fourth module, students compare natural and anthropogenic causes of climate change. Students will understand that the observations can only be explained when both are included in the climate models. Students investigate the potential impacts of climate change in the fifth module. In the culminating module, students will examine feedbacks on the climate system, the probability and uncertainty of the evidence, the various types of climate change arguments, and potential solutions to slow the rate and consequences of global warming.