Worksheet: Climate Change — Separating Fact from Misconception

Audience: Secondary school students, Year 10 | Duration: 20 minutes | Format: Individual, in-class

Instructions

Read each statement carefully. Circle T if the statement is true or F if it is false. For every statement you mark false, write a corrected version in the space provided. One or two words may be wrong — or the entire idea. Think before you write. There are no trick questions, but several statements contain common misconceptions that sound reasonable on the surface.

Statements

1. Carbon dioxide is the most abundant greenhouse gas in Earth’s atmosphere.    T / F

2. The greenhouse effect is a natural process that makes life on Earth possible.    T / F

3. Global warming and climate change mean the same thing.    T / F

4. Arctic sea ice melting directly causes sea levels to rise significantly.    T / F

5. Human activities have increased atmospheric CO₂ levels by more than 40% since pre-industrial times.    T / F

6. A single cold winter in one country is evidence that global warming has stopped.    T / F

7. Deforestation contributes to climate change because trees absorb CO₂ during photosynthesis.    T / F

8. The oceans absorb excess heat from the atmosphere, which means ocean temperatures are not rising.    T / F

9. Methane is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO₂ over a 20-year period.    T / F

10. Renewable energy sources produce zero emissions across their entire lifecycle.    T / F

11. Scientists reached consensus on human-caused climate change only after 2010.    T / F

12. Coral bleaching occurs when ocean temperatures rise enough to cause corals to expel their algae.    T / F

13. Reducing individual carbon footprints alone is sufficient to meet global climate targets.    T / F

14. Climate models have consistently underestimated the rate of Arctic ice loss.    T / F

Extension Task

Choose three of the statements you marked false. For each one, write 2–3 sentences explaining not just the correction, but why the original statement is a common misconception — what makes it sound plausible even though it is wrong.

Answer Key with Explanations

• 1. False. Water vapour is the most abundant greenhouse gas. CO₂ is the most significant one humans directly influence, which causes the confusion.
• 2. True. Without any greenhouse effect, Earth’s average temperature would be around −18°C. The problem is the enhanced greenhouse effect caused by human emissions.
• 3. False. Global warming refers specifically to rising average temperatures. Climate change is broader, covering shifts in precipitation, sea levels, and weather patterns — some of which involve cooling in specific regions.
• 4. False. Floating sea ice displaces water it already occupies, so its melting adds negligible volume. It is the melting of land-based ice — glaciers and ice sheets — that raises sea levels.
• 5. True. Pre-industrial CO₂ was approximately 280 ppm. Current levels exceed 420 ppm, representing roughly a 50% increase — well above 40%.
• 6. False. Climate is measured over decades and across the globe. A single weather event in one location reflects short-term regional variability, not global long-term trends.
• 7. True. Forests act as carbon sinks. Clearing them releases stored carbon and removes future absorption capacity simultaneously.
• 8. False. The oceans do absorb heat, but as a consequence their temperatures are rising — contributing to coral bleaching, sea level rise through thermal expansion, and disrupted marine ecosystems.
• 9. True. Over 20 years, methane is roughly 80 times more potent than CO₂. Over 100 years the figure drops to around 27 times, which is why the timeframe of comparison matters.
• 10. False. Renewable energy produces very low emissions, not zero. Manufacturing, installation, and decommissioning all carry an emissions cost, though far lower than fossil fuels over a full lifecycle.
• 11. False. Scientific consensus on human-caused climate change was well established by the 1990s and formally affirmed in the IPCC’s Second Assessment Report in 1995.
• 12. True. When water temperatures rise, corals expel the symbiotic algae that give them colour and nutrition, causing bleaching. Prolonged bleaching leads to coral death.
• 13. False. Individual action matters but is insufficient alone. Systemic change — in energy, industry, agriculture, and policy — is required at a scale that individual behaviour cannot achieve.
• 14. True. Multiple studies have shown that early climate models underestimated how quickly Arctic sea ice would retreat, partly due to feedback loops that amplify warming in polar regions.