The Carbon Cycle and its role in Climate Change
The students have heard about global warming, but most do not yet have the chemical background to understand what is happening.
The story of Democritus’ definition of the atom can be used to set a basic understanding. Using cheese as a prop as you talk will maintain the student’s curiosity. The story, in brief, is as follows: Democritus stated that if you take a piece of cheese and cut it in half, you still have cheese. If you take that half and cut it again, the smaller piece is still cheese. If you take that tiny piece and cut it again the tinier piece is still cheese. If you could continue cutting the cheese into tinier and tinier pieces you would eventually come down to the most basic of all particles that still have all the qualities of cheese. Democritus called that fundamental particle the atom.
The whole activity you will find in the link provided at the Source.
Meet the Greenhouse Gases!
Greenhouse gases are gases in Earth’s atmosphere that trap heat. They let sunlight pass through the atmosphere, but they prevent the heat that the sunlight brings from leaving the atmosphere. The main greenhouse gases are:
– Water vapor
– Carbon dioxide
– Methane
– Ozone
– Nitrous oxide
– Chlorofluorocarbons
The cards that will describe the activity you will find them in the Source.