With all this negativity in the air, we decided to research some ways in which humans are actually making a positive impact!  Taking a return to some of the problems we identified in the launch of our mini-unit, students are seeing how these particular problems affect each of the spheres of the Earth!  They're also brainstorming possible solutions!

Deforestation depletes valuable natural resources (trees) that provide habitat and an exchange of gases important for humans and other animals to breathe.  Air pollution creates a challenging situation in the air, which ultimately impacts weather, too.  Agricultural runoff involves chemicals (fertilizer) entering our waterways.  And light pollution greatly impacts ecosystems and animals that depend on darkness to survive.  Each of these situations can be rectified, or even reduced by making some smarter choices.  

With that, we began research various "environmentally friendly" solutions students have identified, including some new ones!  We're sharing out how each of these solutions positively impacts all areas of the Earth, as it's impossible to separate what happens in the spheres (atmosphere, hydrosphere, geosphere, and biosphere).

As scientists it's been great to research, share, and discuss our findings!  Way to go 5th graders!

We realized that burning fossil fuels is a huge cause of more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but we didn't know enough about plastic formation!

It was resounding! So many students wanted to figure out more about fossil fuels knowing they hear about them all the time!  Students had lots of questions about them including how they formed, what they actually are, and what was so bad about them!  We worked together to do some research and here's what we came up with!

Students also had questions about what specifically happens when you burn the fossil fuels for a wide variety of activities such as manufacturing, generating electricity, and running automobiles/planes.  We used this simulation from pHET to help us see some patterns emerge.  

We saw some interesting things:

1. When there are more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the energy from the sun gets trapped.  This means the temperature of the Earth rises since the heat can't escape.
2.  When there are more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the energy from the sun doesn't get trapped, and therefore the Earth stays cooler.

This prompted us to ask, "So what can we do to prevent this?"  

Our first steps--thinking about plastics, we are made from fossil fuels. Who knew!?!?!

We launched our unit on Human Impact thinking about all the ways humans are impacting the environment!  We had a long list and here were a few things that students mentioned:

• Polluting the air
• Polluting water
• Wasting water
• Cutting down trees (deforestation)
• Poaching animals
• Depleting groundwater
• Burning fossil fuels
• Using too much plastic
• And the list went on!

Students were then asked about how each of these "problems" affected different systems within the Earth.  But first we had to review what a system was (parts that interact with each other to accomplish something)!  We then began breaking down each of the Earth's four systems:

Our classes spent time discussing what each of these spheres entailed and launched conversations regarding the impact these "problems" make!  Looks like we got some figuring out to do about these problems and how we can come up with solutions!