Mapping Observations of Changing Ice Conditions

ABOUT THIS LEARNING ACTIVITY

ENDURING UNDERSTANDING:

  • Changing ice conditions influences our lives.

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS:

  • What changes have I observed in my own life that may be related to changing ice conditions?

NGSS themes addressed:

  • Practices- Developing models, communicating information
  • Cross-cutting concepts- Stability and change, Patterns, Cause and effect
  • Disciplinary core ideas- LS2.A: Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems; ESS2&3: Earth’s systems, Earth and Human Activity

Culturally-Responsive Curriculum Standards Addressed:

  • A. Integrity of cultural knowledge that students brings with them
  • E. Local knowledge and actions in a global context

Purpose: The goal of this assignment is threefold:

  1. Introduce ourselves and share our own knowledge about ice,
  2. Gain experience with mapping change and using maps for sharing both data and personal stories of climate change, and
  3. Provide a starting point for gauging our collective experience thinking about changing ice conditions (pre-assessment).

Background:

Maps have special power to both visualize data, and serve as a starting point for telling a story. It is no surprise that many novels have maps on the first page. They are very valuable in science as well. For example, the map below visualizes the changes in bedfast ice and floating ice through time for lakes on Alaska's Seward Peninsula.

Maps can also be used to show people’s personal observations of the changing environment. They serve as a jumping off point for people to share their own stories of their relationship with the land and their ecological knowledge. The photos below show notes made on a map after interviewing elders about environmental changes they have observed and how their use of the land and rivers (including winter ice travel) has changed through time.

Activity Instructions:

1. Read the background information above.

2. On a piece of paper, draw a map of a freshwater body (lake, river, slough, pond, etc.) you know really well and have observed over a period of time.

3. On the map, draw the changes that you have observed in or around that freshwater body. You can represent these in any way you want. Use arrows to label the changes you drew on your map with a few sentences so someone else would be able to understand it. Include as many changes as you can think of, but not so many that other people won’t be able to read your map. Besure to include changes you have observed in the winter season.

4. Be as creative or as simple as you want. Don’t spend more than 15 minutes on the map. It doesn’t need to be professional quality!

5. Share your map with 2 or three people in a small group. Did any patterns or trends emerge across the changes observed in differenet places?