Human Energy Systems | Activity 3.1

Target Student Performance

Students explain why Charles David Keeling went to Hawaii to collect data on atmospheric CO₂ concentrations and how he made his measurements.

Resources Provided

3.1 Millions of Flasks of Air Reading (1 per student)
(Optional) “Climate Change is Clear Atop Mauna Loa” a 12-minute radio story about climate change: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9885767

Recurring Resources

Questions, Connections, Questions Student Reading Strategy

Setup

Print one copy of 3.1 Millions of Flasks of Air Reading per student.

Directions

1. Introduce students to the most important molecule of the unit: Carbon Dioxide!

Have students recall the Keeling Curve from the previous activity. Post the question: “How do scientists know CO₂ is increasing in the atmosphere?” Tell them that in this activity they will read a story that explains the research behind this scientific knowledge.

2. Introduce the reading.

Tell students that one of the reasons we know that carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere is because of a scientist named Charles David Keeling and his research. The reading during this activity will introduce us to who he was and why his research was so important.

3. Have students “read a little, talk a little.

Divide students into pairs. Give each student a copy of the 3.1 Millions of Flasks of Air Reading.

Have students read 3.1 Millions of Flasks of Air Reading using the Questions, Connections, Questions Student Reading Strategy. See the Questions, Connections, Questions Reading Strategy Educator Resource document for information about how to engage students with this strategy.

4. Discuss the reading as a class.

After students have had a chance to read the text, ask them for any reflections on the reading. Consider using these questions to spark the discussion:

What did Charles Keeling discover?
Why is this important?
What did you learn from this reading that you didn’t know before?
If you could ask Charles Keeling a question about his research, what would you ask?
What parts of the reading were hard to understand?

5. (Optional) Summarize the reading’s main ideas.

After the class discussion, ask students to share what they think are the main ideas from the reading. Record their ideas on a piece of large poster paper so the students can revisit the main ideas throughout the unit. Consider making a vocabulary wall with words that students needed help understanding.

6. Make connections to previous lessons.

Ask students to recall what they already know about the “Keeling Curve” from the previous lessons. Have them recall what they remember about this graph. Hint: the members of the expert group from Lesson 2 that examined the Keeling Curve may have a better memory than other students.

7. (Optional) Listen to a radio story about the Keeling Curve.

To reiterate the main ideas in the reading, listen to this 12-minute radio story about Charles Keeling and his research. This story provides an audio recording of the “shhhhhttttthhhhleep” sound discussed in the handout. When listening to the story…

Ask students to identify similarities in the main ideas of the radio story and the main ideas from the handout.
Ask students to identify new information in the radio story that was not in the handout.
If you recorded the students’ main ideas on a large piece of poster paper, revise this poster with the new ideas from the radio story.

Assessment

Tips

You may want to display an image of the Keeling Curve on the overhead projector or in the classroom during this Activity.
Remind students that the data they are reading about in the handout and listening to in the story is the same data they examined in the previous activity: the Keeling Curve.