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11.17.2008
Christmas Island (more properly called Kiritimati) lies near the Equator in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. It was discovered in 1777 on Christmas Eve by Captain James Cook. The Island served as a weather station and rest stop for planes traveling to the South Pacific during World War II and was the site of several nuclear bomb tests in the 1960s. Not only is the Island named for the Christmas holiday, but an adjustment to the International Date Line in 1995 means the island is now the first inhabited place on Earth to bring in the New Year.
The National Weather Service maintains a weather buoy off the coast of Christmas Island. For a quick activity, students can compare real-time weather data (i.e. air and water temperatures, wind speeds and presure) from Christmas Island with a second buoy closer to them. As an extension, students can choose several buoys from across the globe, looking at the differences in real-time data between each while trying to describe why those differences exist.
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10.31.2008
COSEE-OS concept maps are designed to help teachers and their students understand the connections and relationships between climate & oceanography. These maps are created through discussion and collaboration and are ideal instruments in revealing their authors' understanding of a topic. For scientists, concept mapping helps them share their understanding of connections in the earth system. For educators, concept maps can be powerful tools for exposing and clarifying topics in the classroom.
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10.30.2008
The COSEE Coastal Trends Scientist-Educator Partnership immerses middle school and high school teachers in ocean science research experiences. Scientists and teachers conduct research and develop classroom resources based on the partnering work. Our program includes:
- A residential week-long orientation that introduces teacher fellows to team members and provides some background on conducting science research
- A six-week research experience in a science research facility
- Extensive follow-up and support during the academic year
- A comprehensive dissemination of fellowship products via the web and through hands-on workshops and conferences
- Stipend, classroom supplies, and travel expenses
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10.29.2008
This guide provides basic information for scientists who wish to engage in education and public outreach (EPO). Engaging in EPO can be an excellent way to address funding agencies’ requirements that proponents articulate the broader societal value of their research.
In this guide, EPO refers broadly to efforts to increase awareness and understanding of science. Audiences targeted by EPO can include students, teachers, children, adults, and just about any conceivable subset of these (e.g., economically disadvantaged youth, adult education instructors, museum visitors, parents, newspaper readers, high school students). Whether you are preparing a proposal or looking for tips to implement EPO effectively, this guide can help you recognize and contribute to high-quality EPO.
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10.29.2008
This guide to teaching climate change fundamental concepts to K-12 audiences is the product of a three-day workshop titled Climate and Weather Literacy: Using the AAAS Project 2061 Science Literacy Research to Develop Weather and Climate Literacy Framework held in April 2007.
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10.28.2008
This document summarizes a statistical assessment undertaken to determine if participation in an 8-week summer science camp at Utah State University increased students’ interest in science careers and fostered their intention to pursue activities likely to lead to a science career.
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10.27.2008
COSEE Ocean Systems, with a team of researchers and other experts from the University of Maine, University of New Hampshire, and Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, was established to implement several integrated activities, each designed to improve COSEE's impact on rural and inland communities. Since fall 2005, COSEE Ocean Systems has investigated issues in educational research that pertain to pedagogy, practice, and the learning process. User feedback has reinforced the desire for interactive products and processes that highlight fundamental concepts as well as their "big picture" connections. As a result, COSEE Ocean Systems is creating and evaluating tools that both highlight basic concepts and can be readily applied to other disciplines.
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10.24.2008
Evaluation Report from the July 17-21, 2006 Teaching Science by Ocean Inquiry Summer Workshop by Sheila Pendse, Center for Research and Evaluation, College of Education and Human Development, University of Maine.
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10.15.2008
Classroom educators are invited to connect with scientists Alex and Elizabeth as they spend a summer in Antarctica (2008-2009). Community members will work to develop lesson plans and activities that can used to bring real Antarctic science to students, educating them on the importance of doing research in places like Antarctica to better understand ocean ecosystems and how the climate is changing.
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08.15.2008
COSEE West offered the Ocean Observing Systems (OOS) Summer Teacher Institute in August 2008 to middle and high school classroom teachers to show them the cutting edge technology of and data collected by ocean observing systems. Ocean researchers and COSEE West staff provided content information about OOS and phenomena recorded by OOS instruments through lectures, demonstrations, and hands-on activities to help them gain a better understanding of the science concepts, the way data are recorded, and how to access and use these data. Some of the OOS instruments discussed include satellites, remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), and moorings and buoys.
The teachers who participated in this institute developed thirteen lesson plans (to be tested during the 2008/2009 school year) on a variety of topics which have been posted on the COSEE West website.
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07.01.2008
This resource explores Australia's Great Barrier Reef, the largest structure on Earth built by living organisms. It demonstrates the types of relationships among living things that have contributed to this incredible biodiversity and elaborates on some of the adaptations that have enabled species to survive and reproduce in this unique habitat.
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02.24.2008
This learning activity is part of an overall series entitled "The Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change". This series of three activities demonstrates some effects of rising levels of greenhouse gases on climate.
The first activity, "How Does the Make-up of the Atmosphere Affect Temperature?", asks students to construct a model to address the matter of increasing levels of greenhouse gases and their relationship to increasing atmospheric temperatures. The second activity, "How Do Higher Temperatures Affect the Water Cycle?", will demonstrate how an increase in temperature will speed up the water cycle, resulting in higher rainfall amounts followed by increased evaporation and subsequent drought. The final activity, "What Will Happen if Climate Variability and Change Cause Glacier and Polar Ice Cap Melting?", will show how the melting of ice can lead to a rise in sea level and subsequent flooding of coastal areas.
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11.16.2007
Follow scientists in this excellent interactive website looking for life in the seemingly hostile hot springs of the Russian Far East. There are four units to explore: getting to Kamchatka by helicopter, following the scientists into the laboratory to collect data, find out why these studies help us understand the first signs of life on Earth, and find out how microbes leave their mark for millenia.
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11.16.2007
Microbes account for more than 90% of ocean biomass and constitute a hidden majority of life that flourishes in the sea. This site contains a variety of educational and supporting materials for students and teachers of microbiology.
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11.13.2007
This excellent tutorial addresses questions about ocean acidification, and the ocean's carbonate chemistry.
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11.01.2007
This compilation of field trips and resources related to the ocean sciences was designed by COSEE West for student, teacher and parent use. The guide includes field trip sites between San Diego and Santa Cruz and appendices on California environmental organizations, programs, and wetlands.
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10.31.2007
This scientific report addresses questions on climate change and public health. Can we use climate and weather forecasts to predict infectious disease outbreaks? Can the field of public health advance from "surveillance and response" to "prediction and prevention?" Can we predict how global warming will affect the emergence and transmission of infectious disease agents around the world? Under the Weather evaluates our current understanding of the linkages among climate, ecosystems, and infectious disease; it then goes a step further and outlines the research needed to improve our understanding of these linkages.
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10.23.2007
The Carbon Stabilization Wedge game, a unique, hands-on learning tool, helps students learn the impacts of different strategies for reducing greenhouse gases. To emphasize the need for early action, this activity strives to drive home the scale of the carbon mitigation challenge and the tradeoffs involved in planning climate policy. It uses the the concept of 'stabilization wedges' - 25 billion ton "wedges" that need to be cut out of predicted future carbon emissions in the next 50 years to avoid a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide over pre-industrial levels.
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07.21.2007
Interactive maps of surface conditions can be clicked on this tool to create in-water profiles of salinity, temperature, or density. Sources include interpolated atlas data or actual measurements from the database.
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06.28.2007
How can we use ice core data from the polar regions to investigate changes in Earth's climate past, present, and future? Students investigate climate changes going back thousands of years by graphing and analyzing ice core data from Greenland and Antarctica.
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06.28.2007
This multimedia CD-ROM provides a virtual microscope, build your own phytoplankton bloom, special topics such as upwelling, and background information in the study of primary productivity and phytoplankton in our oceans.
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04.28.2007
COSEE West online workshop conducted in April 2007 by Dr. Robin Ross, University of California Santa Barbara
(Ecological Responses of Antarctic Krill to Environmental Variability: Can We Predict the Future?) and Dr. Donal Manahan, University of Southern California (North Pole, South Pole: How and Why we Study Polar Regions). Workshop materials include lectures, lesson plans, resources, aligning content to standards, and discussions.
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12.01.2006
The Conference on Ocean Literacy (CoOL) was a two-day forum that took place June 7-8, 2006 in Washington, D.C. The event brought together key participants to discuss the essential principles of ocean literacy and the current challenges and opportunities for both formal and informal education efforts in educating the public to make informed, responsible decisions about the ocean and its resources. CoOL featured a combination of plenary sessions, keynote speakers and panel discussions.
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05.01.2006
This document lists a variety of marine related videos that can be purchased through Amazon.com and DVD Planet, or rented from NetFlix.
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02.28.2006
COSEE West online workshop conducted in February 2006 by Dr. Mary Silver (Harmful Algae of California Coastal Waters) and Dr. David Caron (HABS: Causes, Effects and the Status of Research to Understand Them). Workshop materials include lectures, lesson plans, resources, aligning content to standards, and discussions.
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