HS - ESS3.A (A) - Human Activity and Natural Resources - ASSIGNED (KG 4/30/2014)

Module: Human Activity and Natural Resources

DCI: ESS3.A (A) Resource availability has guided the development of human society.

PE: HS-ESS3-1 Construct an explanation based on evidence for how the availability of natural resources, occurrence of natural hazards, and changes in climate have influenced human activity.

[Clarification Statement: Examples of key natural resources include access to fresh water (such as rivers, lakes, and groundwater), regions of fertile soils such as river deltas, and high concentrations of minerals and fossil fuels. Examples of natural hazards can be from interior processes (such as volcanic eruptions and earthquakes), surface processes (such as tsunamis, mass wasting and soil erosion), and severe weather (such as hurricanes, floods, and droughts). Examples of the results of changes in climate that can affect populations or drive mass migrations include changes to sea level, regional patterns of temperature and precipitation, and the types of crops and livestock that can be raised.]

The ideas here are: 

- the availability of resources has played a role in the development of human society 

Ok... interesting.  So, we are supposed to look for evidence to show how natural resources have influenced human activity.  For this particular batch, it is safe to also include the the idea of how climate change has influenced society, but there is a separate batch dedicated to natural hazards - so we can leave that out. 

The types of evidence we might look to might be availability of freshwater, regions of fertile soil, concentration of minerals and fossil fuels.  It might be hard to find good data on this, but we can for sure look to changes in human society (moving closer to water, to warmer temperatures, etc.) and connect those changes back to a natural resource.  

Here are some websites I found: 

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/impacts-adaptation/society.html

http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/global-change-an-overview-13255365

Ideas for questions: 

-talk about loss of fertile soil due to erosion or some other factor, which of the following effects to humans could be expected? (humans move to another region?)

- list past human societies (mayans, egyptians, etc.), provide some data about each (location, date, activities, language) "based on the information, which of the following conclusions can be drawn about the development of human civilizations?" and we get to the idea that civilizations sprang up around available resources?? I don't know how we do that, but it could be cool. 

- as human populations continue to grow, which of the following can be expected? decrease in available resources?