The suite of interconnected climate-literacy labs on this site are guided by the principles and concepts presented in Climate Literacy: The Essential Principles of Climate Sciences and make extensive use of resources created by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The exercises follow the sequence presented in the figure below.

 

The climate-literacy exercises were developed by faculty at Georgia State University with funding from NASA as part of a NICE (NASA Innovations in Climate Education) project. The name of the full project is “Creating an enduring legacy of exemplary global climate change education for secondary science teachers and underserved students in Georgia.” The leader of the lab-development team is Dr. Jeremy E. Diem of the Department of Geosciences.

These lab exercises are based on a guided/structured, inquiry-based learning model. The labs put the students in the role of researchers as they try to answer three over-arching research questions for each lab. Moreover, the suite of labs epitomizes laboratory science: students ask questions, use models, make predictions, analyze and interpret data, use computational thinking, construct explanations, engage in argument from evidence, and obtain, evaluate, and communicate information. The labs are updated as new climate findings are published and as experts in climate science and instructional innovation at Georgia State University continue to work together to fine-tune the labs to improve student-learning potential.