The site investigates how climate change affects the Arctic’s environments, indigenous people and wildlife and explains how scientists have used the International Polar Year (2007-8) as an opportunity to research the international impacts of changes to shipping, governance and exploitation of the area’s resources.
From exploring the North West passage to learning more than 80 officially recognised Inuit words for ice, students can also take away ‘cool facts’ such as ‘every year a hotel is carved from snow and frozen water in Northern Sweden’ or ‘the town of Churchill is also known as the Polar Bear Capital of the World’.
Building on the success of the award-winning Discovering Antarctica, this website has been developed as another interactive educational resource for schools by the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), in partnership with the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the British Antarctic Survey, and the Scottish Association for Marine Science.
Foreign Office Minister Chris Bryant, welcoming the launch of the website said: “The Polar regions are among the most rapidly changing environments on Earth and a barometer for the future health of the planet. We are proud to have commissioned and funded this educational website, accessible to young people and adults alike, that provides a fascinating insight into what is really happening in this remote, beautiful landscape, as a result of global climate change. It just underlines how important it is that we achieve an ambitious deal in Copenhagen."
Dr Rita Gardner, Director of the RGS-IBG, said: “Discovering the Arctic is a rich resource which we hope will enhance teaching and learning about the region in schools. Although it has been designed for 14 to 16-year-olds, the material can easily be adapted, enabling students of all ages to understand how the people and environments in this challenging and fascinating wilderness are responding to our rapidly changing world.”
Peter Mather, Head of Geography at Greenford High School in Southall, Middlesex, who trialled the site with a class of Year 8 pupils said: “The brilliant thing about Discovering the Arctic is that it’s so new and up-to-date. It really allows teachers to demonstrate to pupils what’s happening in the region right now. Before we started using it, the majority of my class just saw it as the ‘North Pole,’ a vast expanse with not much there except a few polar bears, but the wealth of resources has helped them to connect with the complexities of the region, the diverse environments and communities that are found there, and their important relationships with the rest of the world.”
Discovering the Arctic is designed to be navigated by both teachers and pupils, with downloadable information and activities devised for individual, pair or group work, and multimedia materials that can also be used on an interactive whiteboard.
www.discoveringthearctic.org.uk
