Community Blogs
Open social media sharing options menu
Community Blogs
Discover how the GLOBE community is engaging in all things GLOBE through the community blog posts below.
Learn how to create a GLOBE community blog post.
Filter By:
Blogs List
GLOBE’s Earth as a System investigation area cultivates students’ awareness of an intricate web of global connections. Similar to real world scientists, students explore life science concepts, learning that “ organisms can only survive where their needs are met. ” The Earth as a System investigation area encourages students to observe patterns and connections, such as through phenology. Phenology is the study of how living organisms respond to seasonal changes in their environment. Only through observing and measuring can we notice if changes are occurring and how they occur. ...
Read More »
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
EARTH SYSTEM SCIENCE
Investigation Areas:
EARTH AS A SYSTEM
Blog originally posted on the GLOBE Scientists' Blog: http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/12/19/the-chicken-and-egg-story-of-global-warming-and-extreme-droughts-a-lesson-on-climate-feedbacks/
I recently read that the extreme drought in western North America during 2000-2004 actually resulted in more carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere. In the article in Nature Geoscience , it explained that such droughts can further enhance global warming. When a drought occurs, the plants wither and die and no longer uptake carbon dioxide (normally living plants serve as a ...
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
CLIMATE
CLIMATE CHANGE
Storm Coming Across US
If you live in the United States, you probably have heard of the snow storm crossing the country right now. There will be mountain snow in the Rockie Mountains, a potential for a blizzard from Nebraska to Wisconsin and then some snow to the Great Lakes states.
The National Weather Service (NWS) definition of a blizzard is:
"A blizzard means that the following conditions are expected to prevail for a period of 3 hours or longer:
Sustained wind or frequent gusts to 35 miles an hour or greater; and
Considerable falling and/or ...
Posted in:
Blog originally posted on The GLOBE Scientists' Blog: http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/12/12/the-common-thread-between-science-and-art-creativity/
When you examine a seashell, a crystal, the skin of a snake or the wings of a butterfly, what do you think about? Art? Science? Or the obvious connection between the two? At the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco, CA last week, thousands of scientists, including myself, found ourselves examining the intersection of science and art through a wide variety of ...
Posted in:
Curriculum:
LANGUAGE CULTURE AND ARTS
SCIENCE AND MATH
Lane Community College will be embarking on a comprehensive water quality study for Russel Creek Watershed. It owns property near the headwaters of the creek and it passes through sensitive wetlands that LCC also owns. We will monitor water quality monthly upstream and downstream from the campus as instruments are acquired. Russel Creek is an ephemeral stream. First measurements 12-07-12 at the upstream sampling site near the LCC Learning Garden (our SWS-06 site).
Posted in:
Field Campaigns:
WATERSHEDS
Investigation Areas:
HYDROSPHERE
Learning Activities:
HYDROLOGY
The GLOBE surface temperature field campaign started this week with some record warm temperatures in the United States. Students in much of the United States enjoyed short sleeve weather for several days.
Schools have started to post observations on the GLOBE website. The GLOBE website has been changed dramatically over the last year. The GLOBE Program Office will be adding all teachers in a bulk transfer from the old database in the near future. Many teachers have also signed up on the GLOBE webpage http://www.globe.gov and the help desk has set them up so they can enter data. ...
Posted in:
Blog originally posted on the GLOBE Scientists' Blog: http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/11/20/globe-and-adaptation-to-climate-change/
One of the most significant technology improvements in modern life is our ability to accurately forecast future events. Weather forecasts now routinely extend for five days. The recent flooding on the East Coast of the United States was forecast days in advance. The cause was an unusual merger of two storms to create a super storm – Super Storm Sandy. Atmospheric models correctly predicted that a winter storm coming from the north and a ...
Posted in:
Blog originally posted on The GLOBE Scientists' Blog: http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/11/08/non-stationarity-new-vocabulary-for-a-changing-climate/
A few years ago I attended a workshop for early career scientists to discuss frontiers in integrated water-climate-society vulnerability and adaptation science. This interdisciplinary area of science focuses on the need for using scientific information to not only identify communities that are vulnerable to climate change, but to also help create effective approaches for communities to adapt to climate change. Since every ...
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
CLIMATE
CLIMATE CHANGE
Blog originally posted on the GLOBE Scientists' Blog: http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/10/24/as-the-last-leaf-falls/
This was my first year doing the Green-Down Protocol with GLOBE. I am trained as an atmospheric scientist, so I have taken many atmospheric measurements over the course of my career. I had not ventured into the world of phenology until I joined GLOBE. More so, I am intrigued by this field of Earth Science, since it is closely connected to climate and can be a very good indicator of a climate change.
This year, as part of the GLOBE Phenology and ...
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
GLOBE PROTOCOLS
Blog originally posted on the GLOBE Scientists' Blog at http://blog.globe.gov/sciblog/2012/08/28/full-circle-superior-part-ii-studying-streams/
We have a guest blogger this week. Mike Linke is posting his second blog in a series about his walk with his wife, Kate Crowley, around Lake Superior.
This is the second in a series about the science of Full Circle Superior; a walk around the world’s largest freshwater lake. You can read the first blog post here. My wife, Kate Crowley, and I determined that we would be the first couple to walk around this lake, trying ...
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
EARTH AS A SYSTEM
BACKYARD SCIENCE
CLIMATE
Investigation Areas:
HYDROSPHERE
Learning Activities:
LAND COVER/BIOLOGY
HYDROLOGY
Cologne, Germany
We stayed in Cologne, Germany for several days. While in Cologne, we stayed with Dr. Karl Schneider, his wonderful wife Karen and children. They are always such great hosts. Their son Karl said that he played football. I assumed he meant soccer because the people in the United States are the ones that call the game soccer. The rest of the world says football. But, I was wrong. He plays American football (in Germany). That is interesting. The younger Karl was an exchange student in the United States and played on the school’s football team. Or, I should ...
Posted in:
The newpaper article is below. Take a look. It was very nice of Sebastian to translate it into English.
Getting from Switzerland to Cologne, Germany
After our meeting with the teachers and student at the Alexander von Humboldt Gymnasium in Konstanz, Germany, we made our way up to Cologne, Germany so I could attend and present at the International Geographical Congress (IGC) meeting. I’ve posted pictures of the trip and the cities we visited. I included a little about each city so you can get a sense of the countryside.
Tirol Region of Austria
We started by ...
Posted in:
August 19, 2012
We went to a glacier in central Switzerland. It is a tourist attraction. It was the most unsustainable tourist place I have been to in my life. Usually, at tourist places, they try to have you do things that preserve the site. In the United States at the parks, you are not allowed to take anything away. Dunes are protected at the parks that have dunes along Lake Michigan, etc. But, here, there are thousands of tourists walking on the glacier, there is a cave that they carved out of the glacier, there is even a sledding area. The sledding area may not be too bad ...
Posted in:
August 16, 2012
Yesterday after we arrived in Frankfurt, we walked around the city. It is an amazing city. It is big enough that there is a lot of business but it is small enough that the streets are not clogged with cars. Maybe one of the reasons is that so many people ride bicycles. There were bikes everywhere. Sometimes the people walking have to be careful not to get run over by the bikes.
We went down to the old part of Frankfurt which is near the River Main. The old town area is very cool to visit. I found it interesting that much of the old town had to be rebuilt ...
Posted in:
Tree-of-heaven ( Ailanthus altissima ) is spreading widely throughout West Virginia and threatening the native forest ecosystems in Appalachia. This invasive plant was introduced to the United States from China in the 1780s. The same exotic tree species was also introduced to Japan in 1860s but is not aggressive in this country. In Japan, particularly in the Kyushu Island, tree-of-heaven is rarely found in natural forest ecosystems but a few trees may be found growing in university campuses (i.e. Kyushu University), school premises and house backyards. Tree-of-heaven was initially ...
Posted in:
Establishment and proliferation of invasive species in an environment where they were introduced is becoming a worldwide problem. During my trip to Kyushu University in Fukuoka, Japan in 2008 for a research fellowship, I was able to observe the same plant species that is also considered invasive in the United States. It is called the tree-of-heaven ( Ailanthus altissima ). This trip initiated a project involving a more in-depth investigation of the competitiveness of Ailanthus as an invasive plant. With the involvement of undergraduate students in the Department of Land Resources at ...
Posted in:
GLOBE Science Topics:
GENERAL SCIENCE
Investigation Areas:
EARTH AS A SYSTEM
My student, Kaitlin, presented her GLOBE project at our school board meeting last night!! She also shared her experiences from the GLOBE Program Annual Partner Meeting in Minnesota. There is a nice story about her at www.akronschools.com. You can even leave comments for her. Kids love receiving comments!! Hint-hint:)
I will be leaving tomorrow for my Teacher at Sea research experience with sharks. You or your students (anyone) can follow my blog at www.noaa.gov.
Posted in:
The annual meeting is a blast! Having a student of mine present before an international audience has been such a growing moment for her. I encourage all of you to get yourself and your students to next year's meeting. I've got to get back to work, but thought I would send out a brief message to all of you.
Posted in:
I'm at the 16th Annual GLOBE Partner meeting. It is a great time to meet with old friends and make new ones.
Kevin
Posted in:
Wonderful week!! I am very honored, humbled and excited to have been a part of this exceptional group of educators. I can hardly wait to see all your students' work published.
Posted in:
—
20 Items per Page