Melting Sea and Continental Ice

Materials / Preparation

• A copy of the Melting Ice Record Sheet for each student.
• All of the materials listed at Sea Level Change - Melting Sea Ice
• Two plastic metric rulers for each group
• The experiment requires a visible clock in the classroom that students can all access while conducting their experiments. If this is not available, you will need to provide each group of students with a timer.

Grouping

Groups of four

Teacher tips

The experiment and worksheet on Sea Level: Ice Volume Changes may also be used as a teacher demonstration in which students complete a worksheet while watching the teacher demonstration instead of the student activity suggested in this activity.

Students will be doing both experiments at the same time. They might want to assign tasks e.g. Measurement Taker and Timer for sea ice experiment and Measurement Taker and Timer for continental ice experiment. However, all students are responsible for completing both tables on the worksheet.

If it is not sunny or warm in your classroom, you can also have several heat lamps on hand for students to use.

The student worksheet requires that they measure the “amount of ice” in their experiments. This could be done by either measuring the dimensions of the ice cube, or only the height, depending on your students' comfort level with these types of measurements.

Procedures

1. Return the experiment designs to each team and have them set up all aspects of their experiments before passing out the ice. Explain to them that they will be doing both parts of their experiment simultaneously, so they will need to assign tasks. (See teacher tip above.)
2. As students begin the experiment, ask them "Is there anything we have learned about that would make ice on Earth melt at a faster rate?" Elicit the response that rising global temperatures will increase the rate of ice melt. Ask, "What could we do to simulate rising global temperatures in our experiment?" Allow students to suggest moving the experiments outside into the sun, and then move the experiments outdoors, or set up the heat lamps.
3. Pass out the Melting Ice Record Sheet to each student. Once each of the teams is set, pass out the ice to them, have them measure and record the amount of ice and the water level at the start of the experiment. They will be making similar measurements every five minutes.
4. When students complete the experiment, make sure they answer all the questions on the worksheets. Additionally, ask that they also answer the question, "Was my hypothesis supported? Why or why not?"
5. Have a brief discussion of what they found focusing on what results supported or refuted their hypotheses. If necessary, have students revise their hypotheses in their notebooks based on the results of their experiments.
6. Conclude by asking the question, "Now that we know that melting continental ice causes more sea level rise than melting sea ice, can you think of any ways that we might be able to tell if continental ice ever melted and caused sea level rise on Earth in the past?" Record their answers and tell them that tomorrow they will explore this question further.

Resources used

Sea Level Change - Melting Sea Ice
http://www.teachingboxes.org/catalog.jsp?id=TBOXR-000-000-000-136

Sea Level: Ice Volume Changes
http://www.teachingboxes.org/catalog.jsp?id=DLESE-000-000-008-849