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Teaching about the Sun's energy is supported by five key concepts:

a. Sunlight reaching Earth can heat the land, ocean, and atmosphere. Some of that sunlight is reflected back to space by the surface, clouds, or ice. Much of the sunlight that reaches Earth is absorbed and warms the planet.

The Sun's energy drives the climate system

The sun warms the planet, drives the hydrologic cycle, and makes life on Earth possible. The amount of sunlight received on Earth's surface is affected by the reflectivity of the surface, the angle of the sun, the output of the sun, and the cyclic variations of Earth's orbit around the sun.

The basic science of solar energy and the role it plays for Earth's climate can be understood by middle school students, but the complexities of the Earth's energy balance remains an area of active scientific research. Thus, this topic is both elemental and complex.

This principle is related to Energy Literacy Principle 2: Physical processes on Earth are the result of energy flow through the Earth system.

Show students the basic mechanics of the climate system

Understanding the role of solar radiation in the Earth's climate system can help us grasp important concepts such as:

The causes of the seasons.


The reasons ice ages occur.  
How the amount of energy emitted from the sun (sun's luminosity) changes over time.  
Why recent climate warming has not been caused by increases in the sun's energy output.  
Most forms of energy that humans use are derived from solar energy.

Helping students understand these ideas

Throughout most science education programs and standards, the role of the sun in providing energy to the Earth system is included, but often in a disjointed way. The seasons and their importance in driving seasonal weather patterns and animal migration may be taught in primary school and then not revisited for many years, if at all.

Moreover, students of all ages, including college students and adults, have difficulty understanding what causes the seasons. In addition to the axial tilt, factors that come into play in people's mental models include the belief that Earth orbits the sun in an elongated elliptical path; confusion about the relative size, motion, and distance of the earth from the sun; how light travels; the length of Earth's revolution around the sun; and even the period of rotation. One strategy to mitigate this common misconception is to ensure that the "reasons for the seasons" are adequately addressed in high school, when students have sufficient background in geometry and physics to grasp the concepts (McCaffrey & Buhr, 2008).

A persistent misconception is that our recent climate warming is due to changes in the sun's incoming energy, rather than increases of greenhouse emissions. This can be addressed by examining records of solar output and comparing them to global temperature records. The data clearly shows that the sun's irradiance is not correlated with Earth's temperature.

Excellent explanations for this can be found at Skeptical Science: Sun and Climate: Moving in Opposite Directions and with a graphic from Bloomberg: What's Really Warming the World? This engaging graph is made with NASA data and model output.


Bringing these ideas into your classroom

Solar radiation is the fundamental energy driving our climate system, and nearly all climatic and biologic processes on Earth are dependent on solar input. Energy from the sun is essential for many processes on Earth including warming of the surface, evaporation, photosynthesis and atmospheric circulation. Thus, examining how the sun fuels different processes on Earth can be a part of many types of science courses. Many of the science concepts relating to this principle can be addressed by encouraging seasonal observations, participating in citizen science programs with students (such as GLOBE), and periodically revisiting the basics of how the amount and intensity of solar energy affects Earth's climate.

The ways that the Sun's energy drives the climate system can be taught from a very basic level on upward through the most sophisticated scientific approaches.

Integrating Solutions - The science concepts that relate to solar radiation can be expanded to include solar energy engineering and technology, including solar ovens, passive solar design, solar thermal energy and solar electricity. This can help raise awareness for alternatives to the use of fossil fuel and create a forum for discussions about solutions to climate change that our society can adopt.


Teaching materials from the CLEAN collection

Middle school

  • Globes and other physical models can be used to show the tilt of Earth's axis and how that affects the distribution of sunlight during different seasons, such as in My Angle on Cooling: Effects of Distance and Inclination.
  • Introduction to Earth's Climate - This lesson is an introduction to Earth's climate and covers key principles regarding Earth's unique climate, atmosphere, and regional and temporal climate differences.
  • Feeling adventuresome? Amazing Albedo is a hands-on activity that involves measuring the temperature of different colored surfaces.


High school

  • The Climate: A Balancing Act applet allows students to adjust parameters that affect Earth's energy balance: incoming solar radiation, the albedo effect, the greenhouse effect, and outgoing radiation.
  • Students can learn how orbital cycles and ice ages are well correlated with the Milankovitch Cycles Climate Applet.
  • This Seasons Interactive visualization tool can become the basis for open-ended exploration of how solar radiation varies with location and season.
  • The Solar Influence: Climate Change video from the National Academies can help reinforce the evidence that solar activity is not causing global warming.

College

 

Find activities and visuals for teaching this topic

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References

What's the Sun's Role in Climate Change? - NASA offers an readable yet authoritative look at why solar activity, solar cycles, and sunspots are not related to today's climate warming. NASA has a related post that debunks the myth of an impending ice age.

Sun and Climate: Moving in Opposite Directions This page from the Skeptical Science website provides clear answers to common questions and misunderstandings about climate change.

What's Really Warming the World? - This animated graphic compares different forcings that are acting on Earth's climate. Climatic changes caused by orbital variation, the sun's luminosity, and volcanic emissions are compared with the effect of greenhouse emissions. The graphic is very engaging and the data is from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS).

McCaffrey & Buhr, 2008: Clarifying Climate Confusion. - Journal article from Physical Geography about common misconceptions in climate science.

Additional Resources

Video about this Principle


Inclusive Climate Teaching Guidance