Antarctic Ice Sheet Melting Rapidly
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff WriterFriday, March 3, 2006; Page A01
Does anyone have doubts that global warming is having negative effects on our environment? It’s not like we didn’t think the greenhouse effect was going to make the earth really happy but the increasing temperatures are causing the northern hemisphere to melt at an alarming rate (36 cubic miles per year). It’s happening faster than any scientific predictions.
Question you can ask a person (student): what would happen if the ice caps continue to melt? What would happen there, in that environment; who would be affected? How might it affect you, here, at home?
Another direction science teachers can take is to attach this reality with ecological balances. Suggest that the kids look up common biotic organisms in the Artic (ex. Artic wolf), make a food web using those organisms and then, one by one, ask them how each living thing may be affected by the melting ice.