How Climate Works Activities

Align tree ring cores of different ages to build up a long timeline of past climate data in this hands-on activity.

In this activity, students move chips representing sunlight, heat, and infrared radiation around a series of boards representing Earth and its atmosphere. Students learn how models are constructed and work, and learn about layers of Earth's atmosphere and the greenhouse effect.

The amount of CO2  is increasing, which has an impact on global climate. In this lesson, students will investigate some of the ways CO2 gets into and out of the atmosphere, and how this process might affect the overall balance in our world.

Students use a deck of cards to model climate variability and longer-term trends in climate.

This Teaching Box combines hands-on activities, data analysis, and discussion that help high school students consider how weather can affect cloud types and how cloud types can affect climate.

Students demonstrate their knowledge of interconnections between natural systems such as weather and climate and the built environment in which they live.

In this lesson, students are introduced to the effects a major volcanic eruption has on the atmosphere through recent and historical images and videos and by exploring a simple model. They will learn about atmospheric change that causes a reduction in light to Earth’s surface and how this contributes to climate change.

In this graphing activity, students investigate Oxygen-18 data from ice cores used to investigate past climate.

In this activity, students gather information about atmospheric scientific field projects in order to understand how a research question about the Earth system can be answered by collecting data using many different research platforms and instruments.

Students review illustrations, maps, cross-sections, and graphs that tell a piece of the story about the effects of clouds on climate. They answer "True and False" questions about each visual and discuss what they take away from the information.

Students compare photographs of glaciers to observe how Alaskan glaciers have changed over the last century.

This teaching box provides resources related to the greenhouse effect. It will help you teach how the greenhouse effect warms our planet.

This Greenhouse Gas Game enables students to interact with each other as they learn about the heat-trapping properties of greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. They learn that human actions are altering the levels of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. Teams explore how long it takes to reach the top of the Temperature Tracker based on human activity, with the winner taking the longest to reach the top of the Temperature Tracker.

Students investigate maps and data to learn where and when hurricanes form and how climate change may be affecting them.

Students receive data about tree ring records, solar activity, and volcanic eruptions during the Little Ice Age (AD 1350–1850). By comparing and contrasting time intervals when tree growth was at a minimum, solar activity was low, and major volcanic eruptions occurred, they draw conclusions about possible natural causes of climate change.

This hands-on inquiry activity allows students to explore how the color of materials that cover the Earth affects the amounts of sunlight it absorbs using a simple model.

Students make a model of glacier motion and then design an experiment to figure out what affects the speed of a glacier.

Students create and investigate a physical model to explore how the resolution of a mathematical model impacts model results.

Students examine "pollen" in simulated lake bottom sediment core samples to infer past climate in the vicinity of the lake.

Students analyze the energy consumption of a household appliance and estimate the amount of carbon dioxide it is adding to the atmosphere each year.

In this activity, students will analyze data sets that show how carbon dioxide varies through the atmosphere at different latitudes, altitudes, and different times of year.

Systems thinking is an important concept across the Earth sciences. In this game, students either are a part of a system or serve as scientists tasked with observing and making sense of the system moving in front of them.

Students investigate how thermal expansion of seawater impacts sea level.

Students observe tree rings in a tree cross section sample and analyze tree ring data to interpret paleoclimate conditions.