Using big data to map forests, tree by tree

Suitable for 14-19-year olds (secondary and high schools, and college), this article and accompanying activity sheet can be used in the classroom, STEM clubs and at home.

This resource links to KS4 and KS5 Physical Geography and Computer Science.

It can also be used as a careers resource and links to Gatsby Benchmarks:
Gatsby Benchmark 2: Learning from career and labour market information
Gatsby Benchmark 4: Linking curriculum learning to careers

• This teaching resource explains the work of Professor Tian Zheng from the Columbia University in New York, USA. A statistician, she has teamed up with Maria Uriarte, a tropical ecologist, to understand the impact of cyclonic storms on tropica forests - using big data and AI.

• This resource also contains an interview with Tian and Chengliang Tang, her PhD student. If your students (or you) have questions for Tian or Chengliang, you/they can send them to the researchers online. All you need to do is to go to the article online (see the Futurum link below), scroll down to the end and type in the question(s). Tian and Chengliang will reply!

• The activity sheet provides ‘talking points’ (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) to prompt students to reflect on Tian’s research and challenges them to think about the impact of machine learning.

• The PowerPoint reiterates the key points in the article.

This resource was first published on Futurum Careers, a free online resource and magazine aimed at encouraging 14-19-year-olds worldwide to pursue careers in science, tech, engineering, maths, medicine (STEM) and social sciences, humanities and the arts for people and the economy (SHAPE).

If you like these free resources – or have suggestions for improvements –, please let us know and leave us some feedback. Thank you!