announcement & news

What is the water temperature at your sea, river, lake, pond, …?

Susanne SZKOLA
Susanne SZKOLA • 9 September 2022
21 comments

Dear community,

Together with the European Atlas of the Seas, we are happy to launch the science action phase of the community challenge "Be a scientist! Mapping climate change at seas & coast"!

What?

Climate change can be traced and visualised in many ways.

The community has collectively chosen to do this with its own water surface temperature map in the European Atlas of the Seas.

This interactive map will showcase all school measurements made and make them explorable for class discussions.

This map is empty for the moment.

So now, these temperatures need to be measured and reported across the EU by the community!

Explore your surroundings, learn about data collection & treatment and become a marine geographer with us.

Watch the explanation

For whom?

  • Teachers & trainers from any level – guide your pupils through measuring water temperatures and submitting data to us & delve into the many possible class activities around it.
  • Students from any level – gather and measure what is going on around your school.

How?

Let’s be scientist all over Europe and map water temperatures locally to create our common school map.

Until 31/03/2023

1. Measure the water surface temperature at your water body. No internet connection needed at this stage.

 

2. Fill in the online form: https://ee.kobotoolbox.org/x/RlixrmI2 

Teachers and students can access the form on computer or mobile phone. Mandatory fields are indicated with a star. Other fields are optional. The form cannot be submitted if they are not completed.

data request overview

 

3. Let us know in the comments below if you intend to participate! Which school activities will you run around exploring, collecting and reporting these data?

 

4. We are here to help you. Let us know what you would need to run this challenge. More guidelines? Time? Certificates for agreement with headmasters? A conversation with the challenge hosts?

Files

Comments (21)

Susanne SZKOLA
Susanne SZKOLA • 3 months ago

"What can you do with it?", you ask yourself? Here some inspiration:

Marie Aurélie MAILLOT
Marie Aurélie MAILLOT • 8 months ago

Hello,
I'm a Biology teacher in Reunion Island (French department in Indian Ocean) and I frame the eco-delegates of my school (children of 11 to 15 years old). With our students (6th grade, 11-12 years old), we study marine Biodiversity in parallel of learning to swim. In this context and in order to follow and use the data of this map with the other grade when we'll study climate change, I would like to participate in collecting and reporting these data.
I think that we will collect the data when the student will go learning to swim with their Physical Education and Sport teacher (end of october to end of november) at Saint Pierre (in the south of our Island) and when they will participate in a scuba diving at l'Ermitage (in the west coast of our island).
I hope that we could bring our participation at this project.
Best regards
Mme MAILLOT Aurélie
collège Les tamarins
Marie.Maillot1@ac-reunion.fr

Anica-Maria Tănase
Anica-Maria Tănase • 8 months ago

Hello! I am a teacher for primary education and my students are in the fourth grade. We live in Romania, in the city of Galati, a port on the Danube. The city is located at the confluence of the Siret and the Danube and is surrounded by waters: Lake Brateș, Lake Cătuşa, Lake Partidului. The students will go fishing with their parents and will have the task of measuring the temperature of the water they are fishing from.

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 8 months ago

Looking forward to receiving your data and learning about your activities. Do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions!

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 2 months ago

Dear Elena, Thank you for your message and congratulations on the Drop by drop project! For the challenge, we have not specified how to measure the temperature. You can thus choose the type of thermometer you use. In the online form to upload your measurement, we ask you to briefly explain how you measured the temperature. You can also include a picture if you wish. The aim of the challenge is to help students learn about the benefits of working together as their temperature measurement(s) will be combined with measurements from other schools to create a common map. All schools will not measure the temperature with the same type of thermometer. The measurements will thus not be strictly comparable to each other but we will highlight each time how the measurement was made. The objective is also to help students learn that, when they measure the temperature, they also have to collect other information such as, for example, the method used, the location where the measurement was made and the date and the time. We look forward to your contribution to the new map! Do not hesitate to contact us if you have other questions.

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 8 months ago

Looking for background information on sea surface temperature? Have you seen the maps already available in the European Atlas of the Seas (www.european-atlas-of-the-seas.eu)?

- Open the Atlas.
- Click on the magnifying glass to start searching the Atlas.
- Type ‘temperature’ in the search window.
- The list of relevant map layers will appear.
- Click on (i) to read information about the map layers.
- Tick the box of the map layer you wish to see.
- Close the search window.
- Dive into the map!

In the future, it will also be possible to see your map in this search!

Do you need help to change the language or navigate in the map? Click on the menu (icone with 3 lines) and select ‘Do you need help?’.

IOULIA TSIOLI
IOULIA TSIOLI • 8 months ago

Hello,
I am a science teacher from Greece. I live in Paralia Avlidas, 60 Km from Athens, capital of Greece. My home and my school are very close to the sea. My students have the possibility to get the temperature of the sea water very easily. My goal is to motivate my students to love science and to be informed about climate change. I think that this project will support my teaching method.
I would like to know if we could see on the map the measurements that have already done (The data that the students from other countries or my country have already collected)
Have a nice cooperation!

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 8 months ago

Hello, The map with schools' measurements of water temperature is not yet available in the Atlas. Data collection has recently started. We need to receive more data before the map can be created. So, we will be glad to receive data from your school and many others! When the map will be published, it will be possible for everyone to see the data from all of the schools that have participated in the map. In the meantime, you can explore other maps on water temperature that are already in the Atlas by following the steps mentioned in the message above. These maps include data from drifting buoys and satellite derived data. There is also a map showing sea surface temperature changes over the period 1993-2018. If you type 'oceanographic' in the search window, you can see all of the maps showing different types of oceanographic instruments that provide different types of measurements. By clicking on them in the maps, you can see what they are measuring, for example, water temperature and water salinity. Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 5 months ago

Thank you to the schools in Greece and Romania who are submitting regular water temperature measurements! All measurements are well received. Continue the good work!

Nathalie Van Isacker
Nathalie Van Isacker • 5 months ago

To create a great map, we need data in all European countries. Have you not yet submitted your data? We are looking forward to receiving data from your school! Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions about the challenge or how to submit data!

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