Carolina Coastal
Science
http://www.ncsu.edu/coast
Carolina Coastal Science is an innovative, inquiry-based, science
resource that utilizes the interactive technologies of the World Wide Web to
explore science in coastal Carolina. Carolina Coastal Science has been created
based on the goals stated in the National Science Education Standards. While this
web site has been designed specifically for an Environmental Science component of
a primary and secondary science curricula, it may be used in different curriculum
areas.
Teachers and students can use this web site independently or as a class using a number of different teaching strategies including open-ended inquiries, guided inquiries, independent research, and cooperative group learning. Carolina Coastal Science contains an interactive photojournal that students can use to construct their own set of inquiry questions to explore; an inquiry simulation in which students investigate the issues concerning the fate of the Shell Island Resort and then debate the future of this and other oceanfront structures threatened by coastal erosion; a section of "Inquiry Images" which can be used as whole class guided inquiry activities; and a Coastal Research Technology section that students can use to identify the scientific instruments used by oceanographers and coastal geologists to collect data.
An educators guide is provided with a variety of teaching suggestions to incorporate this site into primary and secondary school classrooms.
Estuary-Net
Project
http://inlet.geol.sc.edu/estnet.html
Estuary-Net is an excellent website for teachers to use guided inquiry
learning activities in their classroom. Estuary-Net was developed by the National
Estuarine Research Reserve System in response to water quality issues arising in
coastal areas. This project strives to develop collaborations among high schools,
community volunteer water quality monitoring groups, local officials, state
Coastal Zone Management (CZM) programs, and National Estuarine Research Reserves
(NERRS) to solve non-point source pollution problems in estuaries and their
watersheds. This website provides comprehensive information about characteristics
of estuaries, estuarine ecology, water quality monitoring; and quality assurance,
quality control, and standard operating procedures of a water quality monitoring
program.
This web site contains a database of monitoring data from National Estuarine Research Reserve sites and volunteer sites. Data includes water temperature, water level, salinity, pH, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, and stream flow. Biological variables and bioassment techniques are also included in the dataset. These include water quality, habitat, benthic macroinvertebrates, intertidal organisms, aquatic vegetation, chlorophyll/plankton, and fecal coliform bacteria. In addition to the datasets, the secondary school volunteer sites contain metadata. The metadata includes research descriptors, entry verification, experimental design, research methods, site location and character, data collection period, associated researchers and projects, data table descriptors, and remarks.
This web site provides many classroom activities from the Estuary-Net curriculum. The classroom activities are divided into three levels in order to provide various degrees of involvement in the subject, ranging from lab experiments to single field experiences to long-term monitoring. The benefit of this scaffolding is that schools which do not have easy access to watershed areas can still participate in the Estuary-Net activities by engaging in hands-on/minds-on laboratory activities. All Estuary-Net activities contain objectives, assessments, time needed, materials, procedures, and hypotheses.
JASON
PROJECT VII:
Adapting to a Changing Sea -
Homepage
http://www.jasonproject.org/expeditions/jason7/index.html
The
JASON VII expedition was conducted in 1996. This JASON Project investigated
marine life and living conditions, including habitats and food sources at the
edge of the sea. During JASON VII, researchers, students, and teachers
investigated several interconnected shallow water habitats in Southern Florida
including the Everglades, Florida Bay, Florida Keys, and relic reefs. The JASON
VII Homepage contains many good learning activities that can be easily
incorporated into K-12 science curricula. Detailed descriptions of the entire
expedition is provided online, including an in-depth look at the equipment used
by the research team.
Oceans Instructional
Materials - Athena
Project
http://athena.wednet.edu/curric/oceans/index.html
The
Athena Project has put together two wonderful interactive, guided inquiry
learning activities that take advantage of oceanographic data placed on the
WWW.
In "Tracking Drifer Buoys," students "experience" how oceanographers use devices called drifter buoys to track ocean currents. Students also learn about satellite imagery of ocean topography. Students are presented with a dataset of information to plot on a map. After this practice activity, students must use information from spreadsheet files to locate the Gulf Stream. Science journal activities are also included. This activity is appropriate for both middle and high school students.
"Ocean Color" is an activity that can be used in any K-12 science classroom.
This activity examines how scientists interpret satellite imagery. Students
create a map which identifies different productivity levels in the ocean and
identify areas of continental vegetation.
WhaleNet
http://whale.wheelock.edu
WhaleNet is a
collaborative project of the biology departments at Wheelock College and Simmons
College in Boston, Massachusetts. It is an educational site devoted to whales,
whale research, the marine habitat and environmental studies. Students are
encouraged to use telecommunicatins tools to ask researchers questions online
in the "Ask a scientist" area. The Satellite Tagging Observation Program (STOP)
electronically tracks whales to study their movements and migrations. STOP
includes data, observations, and satellite tracking maps. Teachers are
able to download a variety of tracking maps for use in their classrooms.
Curricular lesson plans are included to guide the study of the range of whale
movement during their migrations.
This web site also contains classroom activities in which students study the relationships between whales and their marine habitat.
At the WhaleNet web site, students can read logs of oceanographic research vessels. These logs can be used in a variety of activities with K-12 students including graphing a ship's position by plotting coordinate data on a map, analyzing meteorological data such as wind speed, air temperature, water temperature, barometric pressure, relative humidity, and classifying the plants and animals encountered by the research vessels on their voyages.
WhaleNet also contains an area of curricular activities which provide ideas on how to use the WhaleNet data and information for a variety of topics including navigation, water testing, plankton tow and analysis, data collection, photo identification of whales, bathymetry, topographic models of the ocean bottom marine pollution, and data analysis.
This web site also contains a multimedia collection of whale movies and images that can be used by teachers as visual resources in their science classrooms.
The Ocean Drilling
Program
http://www-odp.tamu.edu/
The Ocean Drilling Program
(ODP) consists of research into the history of the ocean basins and the nature
of the crust beneath the ocean floor. This web site can be used in an upper
level secondary education science classroom to learn about oceanographic science
processes. Students can learn about laboratory equipment and the types
of research conducted on board the research vessels. Students can access
online data from a database containing downhole measurements taken from core
samples. Students can analyze the data to look for patterns in the phsical
properties, paleomagnetism, and chemistry of the core samples. This web site
provides excellent maps of the drilling sites. Science teachers can also use the
resources at this web site for mapping activities with their students.
Topex/Poseidon
http://topex-www.jpl.nasa.gov/
This
web site is the homepage of the TOPEX/POSEIDON satellite. Teachers and students
can learn how TOPEX/POSEIDON maps ocean surface topography and how oceanographers
use ocean topography to monitor ocean currents and use data to compute the
ocean's heat budget. Many of the resources at this web site can be incorporated
into secondary science curricula.
The TOPEX/Poseidon science images highlight many of the scientific discoveries of the TOPEX/Poseidon mission. Teachers can use the images to illustrate different ocean characteristics to their students.
The "near real time data" section includes data sets of sea surface heights, ocean wind, significant wave heights, and map coordinates. Science teachers can use this data for data analysis activities and mapping activities with their students.
The "image library" includes graphics of dynamic ocean topography, sea surface variability, significant wave height, wind speed, and precipitable water vapor.
The Educational Resources section contains an online tutorial which presents ideas on how to incorporate the TOPEX/Poseidon data on the Internet into the classroom. This tutorial can be used effectively as a stand alone tutorial for secondary students in a networked computer lab. Many sections of the tutorial contain images which can be used by teachers as presentation materials to explain oceanographic science processes and concepts.
El Niño Theme
Page
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/toga-tao/el-nino/nino-home.html
This web site contains a wealth of information about El Niño. The
material at this web site is appropriate for students in grades 10-12. Graphic
images and animations facilitate learning about El Niño. Extensive
information about the impacts of El Niño and benefits of El Niño
prediction are presented with many web links to recent graphic images on the
Internet. Teachers and students can access the latest El Niño forecasts and
measurements which include global sea surface temperature, equatorial Pacific sea
surface temperature, and tropical Pacific buoy data. These datasets can be used
in the classroom for graphing and data analysis activities.
Ocean
Planet
http://www.seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov/ocean_planet.html
Ocean
Planet is an online exhibition from the Smithsonian Institution. This online
exhibit contains extensive information on many different oceanographic topics
including ocean science, sea people,"SEA store", marine pollution, threatened
habitats, global change, fishing issues, and much more. This exhibit contains many
great animations and movies of ocean topography and also many audio sounds of the
sea. Ocean Planet has many excellent K-12 lesson plans throughout the
exhibit.
A special section of this web site contains marine science and classroom lessons activities from the Smithsonian which adapt several themes of the exhibition for use in the middle and high school classroom. Each lesson plan contains teacher and student objectives, materials, detailed procedures, downloadable student handouts, and links to additional resources on the WWW. These lessons include:
"Sea Secrets" which explores ocean geography, "Sea Connections" which looks at the plants and animals that live in different marine ecosystems, "Ocean Market" which identifies and values many products of the seas, "Pollution Solution" which examines the effects of an environmental crisis, "Stranded Along the Coast" which explores both natural and human causes of animal strandings, and "Reflections on the Sea" which explores the influence of oceans on language and literature.
Ocean Planet is a great resource for teachers who wish to give their students a terrific educational oceanic experience without leaving the classroom.
Sea World/Busch
Garden's Teacher's
Guide
http://www.seaworld.org/teacherguides/teacherguides.html
This
web site contains many hands-on science lessons for grades K-8. The focus of
these lesson plans is for students to learn how people interact with their
environment and how they can best care for Earth's resources. Many of the lesson
plans are interdisciplinary. They integrate science, mathematics, geography, art,
and language. In the "Water Unit," students explore the forms and properties of
water and recognize its key role in sustaining plant and animal life. In "Ocean
Olympians," students learn to conserve our valuable natural resources by
increasing their awareness of the interrelationships of humans and the marine
environment. Each lesson plan contains objectives, teacher documentation,
background information, materials, and procedures. Illustrative graphics
complement the activities.
SeaWifS
Project -
The Living Ocean Teacher's Guide
http://seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEAWIFS/
LIVING_OCEAN/LIVING_OCEAN.html
The materials presented at this web site were prepared for teachers of
grades 9-10 by NASA's Office of Mission to Planet Earth's Education Office and
were published in publication EP-307. This web site presents information about
viewing ocean color from space, the role of phytoplankton in the food chain, the
carbon cycle, and the greenhouse effect. Discussion questions with answers are
included. This web site also includes a hands-on activity for students to make a
greenhouse.
Woods
Hole Oceanographic Institution K-12
Resources
http://www.whoi.edu/k-12/k12-resources.html
The
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution has put together an extensive list of web
resources about oceanography. The specific content areas listed here include
animals, aquariums, careers, museums, polar areas, weather, whales and marine
mammals, and miscellaneous resources. This web site is a good starting place for
K-12 educators looking for a variety of oceanographic information located on the
World Wide Web to incorporate into their classroom curricula.
The Sea Around Us -
Geosciences 40
http://www.essc.psu.edu/~arthur/
Geosciences
40, "The Sea Around Us," is a 3-credit Penn State University General Education
Course. This web site serves as a good resource for people who are interested in
ocean and earth sciences. An interactive syllabus with online lecture notes serves
as an excellent resource for background materials and information for K-12
educators who are teaching oceanography in their curricula. The site contains a
syllabus with many great graphics of oceanic processes that can be used as visual
resources to facilitate student learning.
Scripps
Institution of Oceanography Library -
Oceanography on the
Net
http://www.scilib.ucsd.edu/sio/guide/guides.html
This
web site contains an extensive index of oceanography web links. The index is
divided by the following content areas: biology/marine biology,
climatology/meteorology, oceanography, marine technology, and geology and other
earth sciences. This web site serves as a good resource for science teachers
looking for additional background information on a variety of different topic
areas.
Oceanography
from the Space
Shuttle
http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/CAMPAIGN_DOCS/OCDST/shuttle_
oceanography_web/oss_cover.html
Oceanography
from the Space Shuttle is a pictorial survey of oceanic phenomenon visible to the
naked eye from space. Fantastic visual images are accompanied by text
descriptions. The oceanographic content includes coastal scenes, islands, local
winds, waves, ship wakes, pollution at sea, spiral eddies, and suloys. The web
site images taken from the space shuttle can be used to supplement a textbook for
a variety of oceanographic topics. These images can also be used by K-12 science
teachers for journal writing activities for students.
The MarineLab
Experience Home Page
http://www.mrdf.org/mlhome.htm
This
site is an excellent source for information about planning an extended field trip
in marine ecology. MarineLab is located in Key Largo, FL. The MarineLab Home Page
gives you information about field trip descriptions and destinations. Programs
are available for elementary through college students. The main topics covered
are seagrass ecology, mangrove ecology, coral reef ecology, field identification
of reef fish, invertebrate diversity lab, and astronomy/plankton tow. Whether you
are a snorkeler or SCUBA diver, suitable programs are available. Information is
also available about the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. There are many
photographs and even a virtual field trip included.
Reef Environmental
Education Foundation
http://www.reef.org/index.htm
This site
provides information about ongoing projects of the Reef Environmental Education
Foundation. Contents include reef fish pictures, distinctive features, fish
descriptions, description of the fish survey, survey data, and how to interpret
the data. The survey data would be useful for designing an activity based on
reading a table or determining fish distribution. Information is also provided
about the organization's training programs, collecting sites, how to become a
member, and the "REEF" publication. Also included is a list of other links
related to marine biology. This site would interest elementary level students
interested in learning about different types of marine fish and also high school
students interested in population and distribution studies. It will be necessary
to have a description of the number code in hand when interpreting the survey
data. Navigating this site will present no problems.
The Coral Reef
Alliance
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~goreau/frameless.index.html
This site has a photo
gallery, a place to make diver reports, and good information about
reefs. It also provides you with information about the organization
membership.
USGS Science for a
Changing
World
http://marine.usgs.gov/fact-sheets/index.html
This site includes Fact Sheets on 40 Coastal and Marine Geology projects. The
projects are very diverse. The information could be used in any 9 -12 science
classroom. This information would be good for demonstrating the relevance of
science in everyone's life. Some fact sheets have to do with energy sources and
economic impact of environmental disasters. Each fact sheet includes graphics
and projects. There is nothing interactive here. But the information could be a
basis for other student work.
Institute of Ocean Science
- Ocean Acoustic Group
http://pinger.ios.bc.ca/
North
Carolina National Estuarine Research
Reserve
http://inlet.geol.sc.edu/NOC/home.html
Louisiana Coastal Restoration
Web Site
http://www.lacoast.gov/
UBC - Geo 202 -
Carobonates: Environment
Page
http://www.science.ubc.ca/~geol202/sed/carb/envintr.html
Ocean Challenge/Class
Afloat
http://www.oceanchallenge.com/ca9697/classafl.htm
Institute of Marine and
Coastal Science - Rutgers
http://marine.rutgers.edu/
Aquatic
Network
http://www.aquanet.com/
Neuse River Estuary
MODeling and MONitoring (MODMON) Project
http://www.marine.unc.edu/neuse/modmon/homepage.html
CoastWatch
Program
http://sgiot2.wwb.noaa.gov/COASTWATCH/
Global Rivers Environment
Education Network
http://www.igc.org/green/
Marine
Life
http://www.cyhaus.com/marine/marine.htm
MI-Net: Marine
Institute Networked Educational
Topics
http://www.ifmt.nf.ca/minet.htm
Wind
and Sea - An Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences Internet
Locator
http://www.lib.noaa.gov/docs/windandsea.html
Ocean Voyagers
Program
http://voyager.snc.edu
Estuary, Marsh and
Coastal Dune Plants
http://www.bio.sdsu.edu/wwwplsyst/FlorBio/estuary.html
Assateague
Plants
http://www.assateague.com/plants.html
Salt
Marsh profile
http://service.uga.edu/natmus/marsh/marsh.html
Dynamics
of the Salt Marsh
http://water.dnr.state.sc.us/marine/pub/seascience/dynamic.html
Coastal
Ecosystems Program - U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
http://www.fws.gov/cep/cepcode.html
Restore America's
Estuaries
http://www.estuaries.org/
North Carolina
Coastal Federation Home Page
http://www.nccoast.org/
Year of the
Ocean
http://www.yoto.com/
Science
with OAR
http://www.coe.usouthal.edu/oar/index.html
The
BRIDGE
http://www.vims.edu/bridge/
Project YOTO
Drifters
http://drifters.doe.gov/
National
Oceanographic Data Center's Online Data Access
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/NODC-online.html
NOA/NGDC Marine
Geology and Geophysics Images
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/image/
CHL-FRF Duck Research
Facility
http://www.frf.usace.army.mil/