Climate Change as Simulated by NCAR
http://www.vets.ucar.edu/vg/IPCC_CCSM3/index.shtml
http://www.vets.ucar.edu/vg/IPCC_CCSM3/index.shtml
National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
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Topics
Grade Level
Can be expanded to middle school if educator has background knowledge and guides students well.
Climate Literacy
About Teaching Climate Literacy
4e 
4e Global warming and especially arctic warming is recorded in natural geological and historic records
Other materials addressing 4e
Observations, experiments, and theory are used to construct and refine computer models
Other materials addressing 5c
Benchmarks for Science Literacy
Learn more about the Benchmarks
Computer modeling explores the logical consequences of a set of instructions and a set of data. The instructions and data input of a computer model try to represent the real world so the computer can show what would actually happen. In this way, computers assist people in making decisions by simulating the consequences of different possible decisions.
Notes From Our Reviewers
The CLEAN collection is hand-picked and rigorously reviewed for scientific accuracy and classroom effectiveness.
Read what our review team had to say about this resource below or learn more about
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Teaching Tips | Science | Pedagogy |
Technical Details
Teaching Tips
- This animation could be effectively used in classroom discussions of the broad changes in surface temperature through the Industrial Revolution.
- Works best when students watch one section of the world at a time, i.e., the Arctic first, Antarctica, then their own region of the US.
About the Science
- This animation is based on simulation runs from Version 3 of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Community Climate System Model. This version does not handle deep convection in the atmosphere, tropical precipitation, albedo, Arctic sea ice concentration, etc. included in the most recent version 4.
- Comments from expert scientist: It's a good summary of what one model projects for future temperature. The video is straightforward and gets the point across well. The important scientific assumptions (i.e. emissions) are explicitly pointed out. It also points out the significant cooling effect of volcanic eruptions, which is rarely shown as explicitly.
About the Pedagogy
- There is no direct pedagogical support for this animation, although there are web links and on-video descriptions that make it clear what the video is illustrating.
Technical Details/Ease of Use
- The layout of the animation is excellent, with the distribution of the surface temperatures on the top layer and global mean below, with appropriate labels highlighting important features of the simulation.
- The Quicktime version or full screen is much better resolution than the one embedded on the page.
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