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!?!?!
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!?!?!
RSS Feed