The Greenhouse Effect

The other class we went to at our natural science museum this week was about how the weather has changed and the greenhouse effect. I was amazed at how he made it so simple to understand. And, that he didn't preach "doom and gloom." He said that some scientists believe we are heating our world up, and some don't - that we should read about it and find out more on our own. But, he did explaing how energy from the sun heats up the earth, but that a lot of the heat is bounced back into space. And, how different colors (like the green of the rain forests versus the white of the poles) reflect heat differently. And, I thought he did a great job of explaining how the sun beats more directly on the equator, so it's hotter, and less directly on the poles, so they're cooler.

He had them draw a diagram (above) that shows the sun and how its energy bounces around. And, he talked about how in the Ice Age, temperatures were cooler. Do you know that world-wide the average temperature during the ice age was only 5 degrees cooler??? Then, he took us out in the museum to look at some Ice Age skeletons and fossils.