Prehistoric Climate Change and Why It Matters Today
Lesson Plans
GradesK-8Biology, Earth and Space Sciences, Mathematics
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
Provided by Smithsonian Institute
What it is
- Through this lesson and experiment, students make observations and draw conclusions about what the climate was like 55 million years ago.
- Students are introduced to combining math, science, and paleontology to better understand the history of the Earth and how it has changed over time.
Teaching tips
Positives
- This is a great way to introduce students to fieldwork, data collection, and analysis.
- The lesson plan includes in-depth background information on prehistoric climates, the greenhouse effect, fossil records, an answer key, and a step-by-step guide to the exercise.
Additional Prerequisites
- It is easiest to view the materials by downloading the PDF.
- Although not specified in the lesson plan, playing the videos may be best to provide students with context before the activity.
- Unfortunately, the link to the interactive activity does not work, but it is not necessary for the activity.
Differentiation
- Teachers can use this lesson as an opportunity to introduce climate models.
- The background information available in the lesson plan can be given to students for more advanced classes as extra reading.
- This other activity can be used to learn more about analyzing past climates through paleontology, and this similar activity can be used to learn about other ways of looking at past climates.
From the scientist review
This resource contains lessons on how the climate system is changing, but it is important to study past climates to be able to infer and project future climate risk. Thus, this resource lets students understand paleoclimate and how to analyze past climate from fossils and proxies to estimate temperature and rainfall changes and how it might affect biodiversity, living things, humans, and the planet. This resource is recommended for teaching.
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