Public Science Announcement

Students will find an expedition within the PolarTREC archives and use the research to make a video explaining why studying polar science is important.

Overview

PolarTREC supports teachers on expeditions with real scientists to study in the field. Studying in the Arctic and Antarctic environments can be a harsh and rewarding experience. I participated in Operation IceBridge, an aerial study of the poles collecting data which is then disseminated to the public through the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Operation IceBridge collects different types of information that can be used in a myriad of ways.

Objectives

Students will create a short video describing an aspect of polar science and why studying the poles is important.

Lesson Preparation

• Introduce students to the PolarTREC website.
• Show students various expeditions and photos.
• Do a lesson from the PolarTREC webpage https://www.polartrec.com/resources/search?f%5B0%5D=taxonomy_vocabulary_22%3A195.

Procedure

• Have students explore the PolarTREC site and pick a research project to research and explain to the class.
• Working in groups of three or four, students will use the PolarTREC website and the National Snow and Ice Data Center website to do research on a topic in polar studies.
• Students will pick their topic from expeditions on the Virtual Base Camp (https://www.polartrec.com/expeditions). They can use computers, books, articles, and interviews with scientists to answer their questions.
• The video will be no more than 4 minutes long and should be interesting and fun.
• Students will be graded on their creativity and the science content of the video.
• Before filming can begin, students must show an outline to the teacher with a script. For the outline, students will describe what is occurring in each scene of their movie.

Extension

• Students will create a video trailer for a future research idea (can be used as a bonus opportunity).
• Participate in the JESP Program: https://dickey.dartmouth.edu/joint-science-education-project
• Participate in the JASE Program: https://dickey.dartmouth.edu/environment/programs/joint-antarctic-school-expedition

Resources

PolarTREC Basecamp webpage: https://www.polartrec.com/expeditions
PolarTREC Lesson webpage: https://www.polartrec.com/resources/search?f%5B0%5D=taxonomy_vocabulary_22%3A195
National Snow and Ice Data Center: https://nsidc.org/

Assessment

Use the attached Project rubric to assess the students' videos.

Author / Credits:

Adeena Teres, PolarTREC teacher 2017
Stoneman Douglas High School
Parkland, FL
adeena.teres [at] browardschools.com