Differentiate and show interactions among the geosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere.
| Name |
Description |
| Earth's Spheres WebQuest | This WebQuest is designed for 6th grade students. Students will work individually or in pairs to explore interactive websites and answer the questions on their Task Sheet. This is designed as an introduction to Earth's spheres (Hydrosphere, Atmosphere, Cryosphere, Biosphere, Geosphere) and how these spheres interact to support life on our planet. |
| Journey Through the Spheres of the Earth | The student will investigate Earth's five spheres through a hands-on activity in which they collect data and construct explanations through a lab simulating how interactions occur on the planet from one sphere to another. Students will discuss picture examples of the five Spheres, collect data to generate their own bar graph, and experience interactions between the five Spheres on Earth. Students will be able to identify and differentiate impacts and interactions between the Biosphere, Hydrosphere, Geosphere, Cryosphere, and Atmosphere. |
| Spheres of Influence: Interactions of Earth's Spheres and Their Effect on Ocean Currents | In this lesson, students will analyze an informational text, maps, and data tables intended to support reading in the content area. The article, "Climate Change Could Stall Atlantic Ocean Current" explains how interactions between Earth's spheres can have a global impact on ocean currents, climate, and weather. This lesson includes a note-taking guide, text-dependent questions, a writing prompt, answer keys and a writing rubric. |
| Bottle Earth | Students will learn about Earth's five spheres (geosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere) and how they interact with one another. First, they will watch two short videos. Then, they will create a graphic organizer while viewing a PowerPoint presentation. Finally, in small groups, they will create a closed terrarium (in a bottle) to represent the biosphere of the Earth. They will investigate how ecological systems achieve balance over time. |
| Sea Ice Analysis Grade 6 | The changing climate is an important topic for both scientific analysis and worldly knowledge. This lesson uses data collected by the National Snow and Ice Data Center to create and use statistical analysis as a tool to evaluate the mean and variation from the mean of sea ice loss. |
| Movement of Water Between Two Spheres | Students will use words and pictures to explore the water cycle, focusing on the movement of water from the hydrosphere to the atmosphere and back again. |
| I Will Not Fear My Earth Sphere | Students will demonstrate their understanding of the earth's spheres by creating a travel brochure, highlighting each sphere at a destination of their choice.
Note: This lesson only addresses the first part of the standard; students will need to study sphere interactions in another lesson. |
| Interactions Among the Spheres! | The lesson uses several activities to teach students about Earth's spheres. Some of the activities are:
- A Four Corners (5 spheres) game that gives students the opportunity to move in class.
- Making vocabulary cards with illustrations.
- Visual tools to help students comprehend the differences between Earth's spheres.
- A PowerPoint to challenges students to make every day life connections to the each sphere.
|
| The World of Sphere Interactions | In this activity, students will gain an understanding of the Earth's spheres and how they interact with each other. After a discussion of the Earth's spheres (atmosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and cryosphere), students will complete an exploration activity which consists of a colorful drawing of a specific environment and identifying the spheres, the make-up of each sphere and how the spheres interact to maintain a stable system. Students will present their drawings to the class, with an opportunity for other students to ask questions and identify possible missing or incorrect information, and students will be allowed to make any needed corrections to their drawing. The students will then create a 3D model of an environment that illustrates their understanding of Earth's spheres and how they interact with each other to maintain a stable environment. |
| How Earth's Spheres Play Nicely Together | This lesson plan will guide middle-grade students from understanding Earth's spheres to understanding how these spheres interact with each other. This topic will also address how different events, both naturally occurring and as a result of human impact, can affect one or more sphere. |
| Interactions Between Spheres of the Earth | In this lesson, students will review the spheres of the earth and learn how these spheres interact. |
| Earth Systems Interactions | A two-day lesson plan in which students differentiate and show interactions among the geosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere. |
| Convection Currents | Students observe a demonstration, read an article, answer questions, and make a drawing to further their understanding of deep ocean convection currents. |
| Interacting with Spheres | In this lesson, students will look at images and discuss how the spheres are interacting. They will then read an article, again identifying sphere interactions. Students will complete a thinking map or a constructed response as assessments. |
| The Floridan Aquifer | This is a two-day lesson that addresses the correlation between the annual rainfall and the human impact upon the Florida aquifer. |
| Playing on Thin Ice | In this lesson, students will investigate the difference between melting land ice and melting sea ice as it relates to sea level rise. After guided exploration of Florida's coastline and sea level rise, students will write a letter to local government expressing concern for sea level rise and its impact on Florida's coastline. |
| Changing Albedo in Antarctica | This lesson is an interactive puzzle activity utilizing albedo to explore interactions of the 5 spheres in Antarctica. |
| Spheres all around us! | In this lesson, the students will learn about the five spheres of the Earth and how they interact. |
| Keep Your Cool, Florida | Students will apply the concepts of heat and temperature to a familiar scenario of a parked car heating in the sun. They will predict, observe and explain the temperature data collected by University of Georgia researchers. Students will compare and contrast heat flow in polar and tropical climates. They will identify examples of conduction, convection and radiation. They will discuss how heat flow management is necessary for survival. They will make observations of animal behavior from a video clip and make inferences from those observations. They will read a non-fiction article and cite evidence from it. |
| Story of Interactions between Earth's Spheres | From the standpoint of an organism (biosphere), the students will describe interactions between that organism and the other spheres by creating a storybook including written descriptions and illustrations. |
| An Inquiry into Albedo, Land Surface and AirTemperture | This lesson is designed to provide a hands on inquiry on Sphere Interactions by investigating the relationship between Surface Albedo and Atmospheric Temperature. In this activity, students will develop an Argument Driven Inquiry (ADI) with the Guiding question: "What is the relationship between the land surface Albedo and Atmospheric Temperature?" |
| You've been interacting with...WHO??!! | Students will learn how Earth's spheres interact with each other and how we as humans play apart in that interaction. |
| Water Cycle and Earth's Spheres | In this lesson, students will learn about Earth's spheres using the water cycle. The students will link each of the spheres with a part of the water cycle and have an opportunity to create a cartoon showing what they know. |
| When Spheres Collide | In this lesson, students will do various cooperative group and solo activities that will enable them to know what Earth's spheres are and how they interact with one another. |
| Name That Sphere! | In this lesson, students will work towards a better understanding of the Earth's systems (geosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere) and how they interact with each other. With the use of class discussions and a cooperative carousel activity, students will be able to then create and explain a diagram showing these interactions. |
| Earth's Awesome Spheres and Amazing Interactions | In this activity students will explore the Earth's spheres and how they interact through various activities. |
| No Fear of Earth's Spheres | In this lesson, students will explore Earth's systems and how they interact. |
| Spheres Interact | In this 6th grade lesson, students will work cooperatively in teams to review Earth's spheres and identify interactions among the spheres (hydrosphere, geosphere, biosphere, atmosphere and cryosphere). The activities are designed to create a challenge for students to think creatively about the parts and processes of the Earth system. |
| Earth's Sphere's Poster | The students will learn the Earth's systems, and how they interact by completing an individual foldable and a group poster. The included PowerPoint contains: bell ringer, video on how to make a foldable, power point with definitions and sample pictures for each of Earth's spheres, an exit ticket, sample project and a rubric. |
| Global Climate Change and Sea Level Rise | In this activity, students will practice the steps involved in a scientific investigation as they learn why ice formations on land (and not those on water) will cause a rise in sea level upon melting. This is a discovery lesson in ice and water density and displacement of water by ice floating on the surface as it relates to global climate change. |
| Hydrosphere vs Lithosphere - Globe Toss Activity | In this lesson, students will randomly sample a model Earth (inflatable globe) in order to determine the percentage of Earth's surface covered with water. |
