Educational Material for Water Falls

By NASA Earth Stories for Science On a Sphere.

These educational materials were created to supplement the SOS film, Water Falls. There are also three accompanying docent scripts available: Extreme Events, Importance of Freshwater, and Water Cycle.

Water Falls: Pre-visit Lesson

This lesson plan is intended for teachers to use with their middle school students before they see the Science on a Sphere film, “Water Falls.” The emphasis in this lesson will be on having students learn about the importance of freshwater resources and understanding the processes that take place in Earth’s water cycle.

Water Falls: Post-visit Lesson

This lesson plan is for teachers to use with students after they have seen the Science on a Sphere film, “Water Falls.” The emphasis of this lesson is on deepening students’ understanding of how and why we measure precipitation across the globe. Students will look at TRMM data gathered during Hurricane Sandy, and will learn how this data proved essential in helping scientists to forecast where the hurricane was heading and how much precipitation they might expect. Students will also learn how GPM will enable the collection of new information on hurricanes. This lesson is expected to take about 45 minutes. It has been developed for middle school students, but can be adapted to meet the needs of younger or older participants.

Water Cycle Webquest

In early 2014, NASA will launch an important satellite that will enable us to learn more about our home planet. The Global Precipitation Measurement mission (GPM), will provide us with the most sophisticated and accurate measurements of global precipitation ever! In this webquest, you will learn a little about this mission, and then will focus on the Earth’s water cycle.

Weather and Climate Webquest

Earth’s surface is a complex and dynamic set of interconnected systems - principally the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere. All of the earth’s processes are the result of energy flowing and matter cycling within and among these systems. Weather and climate are shaped by complex interactions involving sunlight, the ocean, the atmosphere, clouds, ice, land, and life forms.

This Webquest has been developed to help you explore the wild and changing world of weather and climate. Before we get started, take a few minutes to think about what you already know about weather and climate. Use your background information and personal experiences to answer the questions below to the best of your ability.