In this activity, students face an engineering challenge based on real-world applications. They are tasked with developing a tool they can use to measure the amount of rain that falls each day. Students will find out why freshwater is important,... (View More) learn about the water cycle, and the need to have a standard form of calibration for measurement tools. They will learn that keeping track of precipitation is important, and learn a little bit about how NASA's GPM satellite measures precipitation from space. This lesson uses the 5-E instructional model. (View Less)

Emphasis is placed on preparing for severe weather events such as thunderstorms, tornadoes and blizzards. Following classroom discussion and internet research, students prepare and present a product (brochure, poster, video, etc.) on the... (View More) characteristics of one type of severe weather event and the appropriate preparation details. The Students' Cloud Observations On-Line (S'COOL) project engages students in making and reporting ground truth observations of clouds then comparing those observations with data from the CERES satellite instrument. (View Less)

Assuming the role of a meteorologist, students will proclaim one month as "Thunderstorm season" for their chosen study area. This decision will be based on analysis of deep convective cloud data downloaded from the Live Access Server. This lesson... (View More) uses student- and citizen science-friendly microsets of authentic NASA Earth system science data from the MY NASA DATA project. It also includes related links, extensions, and an online glossary. (View Less)