Let's create continuous conversations about climate change education: Spreading the Sediment of Science!

The Secret Life of Corals: Dominican Republic Adventure

Provided by: Nature Lab by the Nature Conservancy

Lesson Plans Grades 3-5, 6-8

Synopsis

This teacher's guide provides discussion questions with answers about coral reefs, as well as many links to resources for learning about coral reefs and the threats they face from warming oceans and ocean acidification.
The resources linked include videos, experiments, data exploration tools, maps, and lesson plans and activities for the classroom.

Subjects: Biology

Authors: Nature Lab by The Nature Conservancy

Region: Global

Languages: English

Positives

This teacher's guide provides engaging resources for covering warming oceans and ocean acidification.
Interactive data maps and experiments allow students to explore in a hands-on way the effects of climate change on the ocean.

Prerequisites

There are many different links to choose from, and teachers should preview this resource in advance in order to make a decision about what to use in the classroom.
This guide is a companion for The Secret Life of Corals: A Dominican Republic Adventure virtual field trip, which is not linked in the resource. Teachers can find the video for this guide and prerequisite lessons for this teacher guide HERE.
If teachers are playing the virtual field trip video, they can skip to 2:50, as the portion before this is for the live event. Teachers can also stop the video at about 42:00, as the rest of the video is acknowledgments.
The links to resources on cisanctuary.org are broken.

Differentiation & Implementation

This teacher's guide can be used in science classes for units about human impacts on the environment and biodiversity.
Teachers can use this resource in a flipped classroom format, having students watch the virtual field trip as homework to prepare for an in-class discussion.
These resources can be used along with our high school biology lesson on ocean acidification.
This teacher's guide can be used in a social studies class to discuss how different parts of the world are affected by the effects of climate change on the ocean.
This video can be used to discuss solutions and what we can do to protect coral reefs.

Scientist Notes

Teaching Tips

Standards

Resource Type and Format

All resources can be used for your educational purposes with proper attribution to the content provider.