How many of you know that Antarctica is actually a desert?  Even though the continent holds 70% of the world's supply of fresh water it's as dry as the Sahara.  So first of all, what is a desert?  Well, if you look it up in the dictionary it may say something like: "A barren region, incapable of supporting populations or vegetation".  Normally, people think of hot, dry regions like the Sahara when they think of deserts, but the polar regions are deserts also.  Technically, an area is defined as a desert if it is dry, i.e. if the amount of evaporation in the area exceeds precipitation.  Believe it or not, there actually is very little precipitation in Antarctica.
 

Question 1.
How is Antarctica different from where you live?  Use the following chart and information provided to you from the internet to determine the differences between where you live and Antarctica.
 

Question 2.
What was the most surprising fact about Antarctica that you discovered using this chart?  How close is the province you live in representative of life in Antarctica?

One place where you may see some of the same environmental conditions found in Antarctica is in the Arctic.  In Canada we are very lucky to have such easy access to the north.  In fact, most Canadians take it for granted.  Did you know that roughly 80% of the population of Canada lives within 150 kilometres of the border with the United States?  Ask around in your class to see who has been the furthest north.  Then find that location on a map and compare it with the location of Ellesmere Island.

Question 3.
While Antarctica may seem like a foreign place to you, Canada (even southern Canada) was once covered with a huge ice sheet and the climate resembled present day Antarctica.  Knowing that there is a finite supply of water on the Earth, where do you think the ice came from? (the answer is not "the north"!)  What do you think happened to sea level when the there was a large ice sheet on the land?  To learn more about how the ice sheet affects us even today go to lesson 6.

Question 4.
While Antarctica and the Arctic may have similar names, and generally similar environments they are pretty different places believe it or not. Using the chart above, compare the environmental variables of the Arctic with Antarctica.  Why are the elevations of Antarctica and the Arctic so different?  (Remember that most of Antarctica is covered with very thick ice sheets)   What is needed for these ice sheets to grow as big as they are?
 
 

At one point in Earth's history, Antarctica was joined to South America, Australia and Africa in one "super-continent".  This continent once occupied a position close to the South Pole.  This explains why there is evidence for glaciation in Africa, a continent where there is no present glaciation.  Can you research what other odd facts make sense when the super-continent idea is known?

For hints try this link:

Introduction to Plate Tectonics:  make sure that you use the arrows to explore the web page.  You can get a lot of information about Antarctica and it's role in the theory of Continental Drift here.