ND Curriculum Initiative

Subject & Standards

Needs Assessment/Rational

Oceanography is a key component of Earth Science. Most of my students have never seen the ocean. Even those who have seen the ocean,will have a difficult time visualizing how currents move in the ocean. The idea of how the wind patterns form is abstract to many middle school students who are not abstract thinkers. Using wind patterns to define ocean currents is another repetition of the concept to help them grasp this concept. Students in my classes make many mistakes when plotting latitudes and longitudes. Using this skill to study ocean currents will help them to improve on this map skill. We live in a global community. We need to understand how things we place in the ocean will affect other parts of the world and other people as currents carry objects and pollution around the ocean and even around the world.

Understandings & Goals

Enduring Understanding: The wind systems of the Earth make surface currents on the ocean. These currents carry heat and objects all over the world. Ocean pollution is a world problem because these currents can carry pollution from one location to the rest of the world. Goal(s): Students will understand how and where ocean currents form. Students will be able to predict where on Earth an object will travel in an ocean current. Students will locate ocean buoy data on the internet and record it in an Excel spreadsheet. Students will plot latitude and longitude points of a buoy on a map produced from the internet to track the path of a current. Students will analyze data and present the results and conclusions to their peers.

Questions Answered

Essential questions: How do winds make ocean currents? Where do these currents form? Where will currents carry pollution or objects that end up in the ocean? Objectives: Given class discussion and map activities, the student will be able to accurately identify and draw ocean currents with 100% accuracy. Given a web address and internet access, the student will be able to locate the cite and enter the location data of a selected buoy into an Excel spreadsheet with 100% accuracy. Given the starting location of a buoy in the ocean, the student will be able to hypothesize where the buoy will travel with ocean currents with 80% accuracy. Given the encarta.msn.com/atlas web site, the student will be able to select a map of the appropriate area of the ocean to plot the buoy. Given a world map and buoy locations data from a spreadsheet, the student will be able to plot the latitude and longitude within 5 degrees of latitude and longitude accuracy. Given the plotted path on a map and the student’s hypothesis, the student will be able analyze the correctness of his/her hypothesis and support the rational with three or more arguments. Given a digital camera and a Microsoft Powerpoint, the student will be able to organize his/her results and display them in a powerpoint demonstration that meets a PowerPoint rubric with a minimum rating of 2 for proficiency.

Assessment

What quiz and test items (e.g. simple content-focused questions that require a single, best answer) will provide evidence of understanding? Students will read Glencoe Text on ocean currents and complete the notes for the chapter. The student will label a world map with surface winds and surface currents as demonstrated in the Gencoe Earth Science text. The student will access a website and select a buoy to track. The student will copy the buoy latitude and longitude locations into an Excel spreadsheet. The student will plot the latitude and longitude locations on a world map. The student will prepare a PowerPoint presentation containing a digital picture of the completed world map and other required information and present it to the class. What academic prompts (e.g. open-ended questions or problems that require students to think critically and then to prepare a response / product / performance) will provide evidence of understanding? Can you predict where your selected buoy will travel? The student will predict where the buoy will travel. Can you determine how well you predicted path of your buoy and give 3 arguements to support your conclusion? The student will compare the actual path of the buoy to his/her hypothesis about its travel. How does the path of the buoy teach us about ocean pollution and why we can say it is a global problem? What performance tasks and projects (e.g. complex challenges that are authentic, mirror the real world and require a performance or product) will you include that will provide evidence of student understanding? I will observe the student successfully locating the web site on the computer. Students will copy the data into an Excel spreadsheet and plot the locations on a map. Students will find an appropriate map from the Encarta MSN Atlas. Students will use a scanner or digital camera to copy their maps. I will observe the Powerpoint demonstration the student presents to the class. What other evidence (e.g. observations, work samples, dialogues, student self-assessment) of understanding will you collect? I will collect a completed map worksheet based on Glencoe Earth science diagrams. I will collect a copy of the Excel spreadsheet that contains the latitude and longitude locations of the buoy selected by the student. I will collect the map of plotted locations the student generates from the spreadsheet.

Instructional Strategies

The students will use inquiry-based strategies when hypothesizing about the path the buoy will travel, tracking the locations on a map, and analyzing the results to form a conclusion about how accurately they predicted the buoy’s path. Students will apply the information about the travel of buoys in ocean currents to the real world concern about ocean pollution and how it is transferred globally. Students will use the project-based strategy to make a table and a graph in Excel. Students will present their findings to the class. It will be necessary for them to defend and support their hypothesis and the conclusions they make.