Climate Postcards
https://scied.ucar.edu/activity/climate-postcards
https://scied.ucar.edu/activity/climate-postcards
Lisa Gardiner, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research Center for Science Education
This activity takes approximately 60 minutes
Learn more about Teaching Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness»
See how this Activity supports the Next Generation Science Standards»
Grade Level
Online Readiness
Climate Literacy
This Activity builds on the following concepts of Climate Literacy.
Click a topic below for supporting information, teaching ideas, and sample activities.
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Teaching Tips | Science | Pedagogy |
Technical Details
Teaching Tips
- The activity suggests one hour of teacher prep time, but the described prep could likely be completed in 30 minutes.
- If teachers know of a recent death of a grandparent in their classroom, this should probably be addressed individually with the student beforehand.
- Extension projects, such as researching a specific climate and making their own postcard could be used as an assessment.
- This activity could be modified for 2nd graders with more scaffolding.
- This activity could easily be adjusted so that it is a friend, or other person traveling instead of "grandma".
About the Content
- In this activity, small groups of students explore five climate zones (tropical, dry, mild, cool, polar) as defined by the Köppen Climate Classification System.
- They connect information from postcards from an imagined grandma world traveler to graphical data on climate and rainfall to determine which zones the postcards are from.
- Passed initial science review - expert science review pending.
About the Pedagogy
- Through a clear step by step process, students examine easy-to-read data of each zone.
- In small groups students discuss each area and decide on clothing they would wear in each zone. Next, they read and look at postcards sent by a fictional grandmother who gives clues about the zones she has visited. Students then decide which zone she sent the post card from.
- They also explore a map of the world to compare and discuss the zones included in the postcards.
- Students will need a small amount of experience with reading graphs.
- The teacher's guide is clear and concise.
- Assessment can be completed with the use of the extensions.
- Background data and extensions support the activity well.
