Monitoring Our Changing World Resources
Resources and links for the “Monitoring our Changing World” curriculum.
Teaching slides for “Monitoring our Changing World” curriculum.
Investigation 1: Exploring Changing Habitats: Students learn that observing and monitoring birds and their habitats helps us understand and conserve our changing world. They are introduced to eBird and citizen science.
- The Living Bird article, “Vanishing: More than 1 in 4 Birds Has Disappeared In the Past 50 Years,” shows the huge impact of habitat loss and the importance of conservation.
- The “3 Billion Birds Lost” video summarizes the above article’s findings. Also included are the full study and some next steps.
- You can download the “State of the Birds 2019” report here.
Investigation 2: Identifying Birds: Students learn species identification skills and the anatomical parts of a bird. They apply their knowledge with the Merlin Bird ID app to go birding.
Investigation 3: Digging Deeper with Bird ID: Through observing birds, students will understand how behavior and sounds help with identification.
- The Bird Song Hero learning game helps students learn common bird songs with spectrograms.
- See past and live bird entries with the eBird live submissions map.
- All About Birds Online Field Guide is an extensive, easy-to-use guide for identifying birds found in North America.
Investigation 4: Monitoring Migration: Students define and explain migration patterns and habitat challenges. They encounter the abundance model and read other maps and models.
- eBird Explore section
- All About Birds Online Field Guide is an extensive, easy-to-use guide for identifying birds found in North America.
- See the MacGillivray’s Warbler habitat association regional charts here.
- Learn more about the habitat association regional charts and find other species’ charts.
Investigation 5: Population Dynamics: Students will understand how carrying capacity affects a species’ population size and how this aids conservation.
Investigation 6: Complex Impacts of Climate Change: Students will observe how trends in citizen-science data can indicate changes in habitat, including those caused by climate change.
Investigation 7: Think Globally: Students define “wicked problem” in the context of climate change and brainstorm possible solutions.
- All About Birds Online Field Guide is an extensive, easy-to-use guide for identifying birds found in North America.
Investigation 8: Act Locally: By participating in citizen science students learn that they can contribute to local and global efforts to monitor and conserve birds.