Earth Systems Investigation Tests

Download Earth Systems investigation tests in either Microsoft Word or Adobe pdf formats for primary school:

 

Earth Systems Making Connections

Grade Level
Student Version
(formatted to hand out to students)
Teacher Version
(includes sample answers)
Primary

 

 

Check out the Templates section to see how to design your own investigation problems
Check out the Rubrics section to see how investigation scoring rubrics are developed

 

 

You can also view the teacher version of the Making Connections assessment here:

 

(Present problem requiring use of GLOBE data archives)

The students in your classroom are GLOBEpals with students at another school. You like to print out the photographs taken from your GLOBEpal school. It helps you imagine what is happening at their school so that you can write more interesting notes to them. In this activity you will look at the study site photographs made by your GLOBEpals.

1. (Take measurements: Make appropriate observations given data from GLOBE archives) AND (Analyze and compare: identify similarities and differences) Look at the photo labeled April 3rd . Does this picture look similar or different to what happens at your school in early April? Write your answer in Table 1.

Table 1: Comparing Our School and the School in the Photo

Things that are the same as at our study site
Things that are different from our study site
Answers will vary but should include comparisons of temperature and green leaf development. Additional comparisons may include geology or man-made structures. Answers will vary but should include comparisons of temperature and green leaf development. Additional comparisons may include geology or man-made structures.

2) (Analyze and compare: Identify similarities and differences) Is the study site in the photo more similar to your school, or more different than your school? How did you decide?

Answers will vary but should include a comparison of the number of similarities compared to the number of differences.

3) (Take measurements: Make appropriate observations given data from GLOBE archives) & (Analyze and compare: identify similarities and differences)

Now look at the photograph labeled April 3rd and the photograph that was taken on May 14th.

Table 1: Comparing photographs from April 3rd and May 14th

Things that are the same about the study site on April 3rd and May 14th
Things that are different about the study site on April 3rd and May 14th
Answers will vary but should include location of sidewalk/street, location of large trees and bushes. Answers will vary but should include a comparison of cloud cover, amount of tree leaf development, amount of grass development, absence of snow. Some students may comment on the difference in perspective, i.e. the May 14th picture was taken at a greater distance.

4) (Interpret GLOBE data: infer patterns and trends) Describe two or more things that you predict will look different between the photograph from May 23rd and a photograph that would be taken three weeks later on June 4th.

Answers will vary. Some differences may include: more grass, more leaves on trees, different clouds, presence of rain, presence of flowers or animals.

5) (Summarize Data & Communicate Findings: Summarize and report findings) Write a GLOBEmail to your GLOBEpals. Write to them about what they will be doing on June 4th and how that will be the same or different from what you will be doing on that day. Draw a picture that shows your prediction of what their GLOBE school site will look like on June 4th .

Answers will vary but should include a student drawing that attempts to hold constant the variables they identified as similiarities in question 3.

 

 

 

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GLOBE is supported by NASA, NSF and the US Dept. of State.

Page last updated on March 11, 2002