Worksheet Ocean Currents c02-01

Subjects:

geography, social studies, language, media studies

The exercise is suitable for use

General skills: Assessing the validity of scientific information; studying differences in presentation styles for different audiences
Contents:Assessing the scientific content of an Internet news report against previous knowledge; comparing different versions of the same story, aimed at different audiences.

SEOS web-pages that deal with surface currents:
- Nike trainers and rubber ducks (ch.1, p.2)
- Wind driven surface currents (ch.2) - particularly the global current maps.
Student work sheets containing two news reports from 2007 reporting on the voyage of a boatload of plastic toys spilt in 1994.
- Download work sheets in RTF format
Optional:
- Amrican Geophysical Union (AGU) Ocean Science report on the scientific use of the plastic toys.
  Download report in RTF format.
- On-line reports of the 'Plastic Duck' story from different news and scientific media.
  (The search terms "ocean current" and "ducks" should find a large number of these.)
- Map of global surface currents
  Download A4-size global current map (PDF)

1 school lesson:
- Study the maps of ocean currents provided on the SEOS web pages
- Read and compare the news stories provided in terms of reliability
In addition students can be asked to:
- browse the Internet and download other versions of the same story
- assess the reliability of these versions against known information about surface currents
- compare the stories they have found in terms of reliability, style and detail of scientific content
- classify the different Internet versions of the story in terms of target audience.

modify the work sheet according to your needs and time schedule
ask the students to collect and analyse the information they need to assess the different reports
in their groups the students should divide the workload among them and discuss their results

Download Worksheet "Fact or Fiction?" for use in class