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Deforestation in the Amazon
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003600/a003637/index.html

NASA Visualization Studio

This NASA animation on land cover change zooms into Rondonia, Brazil. It starts with a Landsat satellite image taken in 1975 and dissolves into a second image of the same region taken in 2009 that illustrates a significant amount of land use change.

Learn more about Teaching Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness»


Grade Level

Regional Focus

Topics

Climate Literacy

This Animation builds on the following concepts of Climate Literacy.

Click a topic below for supporting information, teaching ideas, and sample activities.

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 how CLEAN reviews teaching materials
Teaching Tips | Science | Pedagogy | Technical Details

Teaching Tips

  • It is suggested that this be used as part of a unit on ecosystems and climate change.
  • There is no color key provided for the images. However, the images clearly indicate significant land cover change.

About the Content

  • Tropical forests act as major carbon 'sinks', places where ambient carbon dioxide in the atmosphere can be absorbed by growing things and sequestered for years.
  • Data taken in 1975 and 2009 from the Landsat series of spacecraft shows enormous tracts of forest disappearing in Rondonia, Brazil.
  • Comments from expert scientist: Short and easy to read piece on a globally important topic. Visuals clearly show the effect of deforestation on land cover. There are a number of other similar NASA websites that seem more up to date.

About the Pedagogy

  • Scaffolding of the visualization is provided in accompanying text.

Technical Details/Ease of Use

  • The visualization is very easy to use.
  • Multiple versions of the visualization are provided in different resolutions and formats.
Entered the Collection: August 2013 Last Reviewed: September 2016

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