Maybe we're over illuminated? Light pollution gets the least amount of press, though Houghton Mifflin has a story in the 3rd grade reader about Puffins in Iceland who get confused by the city lights at night and land in the town instead of the water. The local kids run through town collecting the confused birds and release them at the beach.
Excessive artificial light has been shown to disrupt migratory patterns of birds and sea turtles and other animals and studies suggests it leads to excessive algae growth in lakes due to its effect on the zooplankton Daphnia which eats algae.
Then there's the effect of light on our sleep patterns and the consumption of electricity by all of those leds on our electronic devices.
Too much of anything usually is a bad thing.
Excessive artificial light has been shown to disrupt migratory patterns of birds and sea turtles and other animals and studies suggests it leads to excessive algae growth in lakes due to its effect on the zooplankton Daphnia which eats algae.
Then there's the effect of light on our sleep patterns and the consumption of electricity by all of those leds on our electronic devices.
Too much of anything usually is a bad thing.
Have you seen the animations of air traffic patterns?
ReplyDeleteGlobal Air Traffic over 24 hours
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4g930pm8Ms&feature=related
National Air Traffic
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6E_Z_Ve-ayA&feature=fvw
Also, here's stop motion project that could be done in a class.
"Stars in the Night Sky"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lm2Y2fX-mw&NR=1
Kids could compose & record music to go along with images.
What DO twinkling stars sound like?