WEATHER AND ATMOSPHERE LEARNING TARGETS

Focus Question / Detailed Explanation / Real World Example: Draw a Picture(caption) or Write in Words
1a. Draw and describehow the sun’s energy (radiation) travel to Earth and what happens to it after it arrives at Earth. / The sun sends energy to the earth in the form of radiation / light, and it is changed into thermal energy (heat) some of which is absorbed by land and oceans.
This energy transfer is done without contact which is why it is radiation and not conduction.
1b. How much of the sun’s energy reaches the Earth? Explain why. / Although the sun radiates a huge amount of energy, 50% is absorbed by the Earth Surface. Approximately 30% is reflected back to space while the rest is absorbed by clouds and atmosphere gases.
2. Describe the process of conduction, and how it relates to atmospheric heating / The transfer of heat energy through a material.
Conduction relates to atmospheric heating by the warmed earth (land and water) transferring its heat to the air it comes in contact with.This warms the atmosphere.
3a. Describe what convection is.
3b. What are two examples of convection? / The transfer of heat energy through liquids and gases by moving particles.
The warm air/water becomes less dense and rises,
The cool air/water becomes more dense and sinks as it moves away from the earth’s surface and sinks back down.
  1. Rice boiling on the stove
  2. Convection oven

4. Describe how clouds are formed. / Water vapor rises and cools and condenses around dust and other particles. This forms clouds.
5. Describe the atmosphere as a mixture of gases. / The atmosphere is composed of 78% Nitrogen & 21% Oxygen & 1% other gases.
Nitrogen, with lesser amounts of oxygen, and a very small amount of other trace gases.
Note carbon dioxide is a tiny fraction of the 1%.
6. Explain the greenhouse effect. / The Greenhouse Effect is a warming up of the Earth from certain gases (Carbon Dioxide, Water Vapor, Methane, Nitrous Oxide, Oxygen) in the atmosphere. Atmosphere acts like a blanket for the earth and controls the heating up and cooling off at night.
7. Describe how greenhouse gases are important to the Earth? / Solar Radiation (Sunlight) when it reaches the Earth it is soaked up by land, water and plants. But, a lot of this energy is sent back into the atmosphere in the form of infrared heat. The greenhouse gases absorb some of that HEAT and send it back down to the Earth’s surface. This keeps the Earth warm.
8. Describe how temperature, density and air pressure changes with elevation. / Air temperature:
At higher elevations the air temperature is generally colder in the troposphere.
Air density:
Decreases as altitude increases.
for example-the number of oxygen molecules per breath is less on a mountain than at sea level
Air pressure:
As altitude increases air pressure decreases since the air gets thinner as elevation increase in the troposphere.
9. List and describe features of the atmosphere as you move away from the earth’s surface / Troposphere-the lowest layer of the atmosphere. it contains almost 90% of the atmosphere’s total mass! almost all of the earth’s carbon dioxide, water vapor, clouds, air pollution, weather, and life-forms are in the troposphere. weatheroccurshere.
Stratosophere-the atmospheric layer above the troposphere. almost all of the ozone in thestratosphere is contained in the ozone layer.
Mesosphere-above the stratosphere is the mesosphere.the middle layer of the atmosphere.it is also the coldest layer.
Thermosphere-the uppermost atmospheric layer. in the thermosphere, temperature again increases with altitude.
Ionosphere-in the upper mesosphere and the lower thermosphere. nitrogen and oxygen atoms absorb harmful solar energy. these ions radiate energy as shimmering lights called auroras.
Exosphere: where atmosphere and space blend.
10. Describe how much air temperature affects how much water vapor it can hold. / Cool air holds less water vapor than warm air. Cold air molecules are closer together and there is less room between them. a cool air mass will fill up quickly with precipitation and will empty out (in the form of rain or snow). Warm air masses have particles that are farther apart. there is more room in a warm air mass and it will take more water vapor to fill it up. The air might feel humid because there is more water in the air. / If the temperature drops on a warm humid day, then it rains because cold air cannot hold as much water vapor.
11. Describe what wind is and how it moves / Wind is the movement of air from areas of high pressure to areas of low pressure. /
12. Describe how the sun causes winds / The pressure differences are caused by the sun’s uneven heating of the earth’s surface. / Air heats up at the doldrums (equator) and move toward the poles where it cools and sinks.
13. Explain the Coriolis effect and how it influences winds. / The Coriolis effect occurs because of the earth’s rotation.
it causes the wind to curve to the right in the northern hemisphere /
Pilots have to adjust their flight path when they travel from detroit to miami.
14. Describe what cause weather. / Weather is due to the motion of the atmosphere from the sun’s uneven heating of the earth. ( Air masses come into contact with each other- causing changing weather) / Once in
January there was warm weather in Michigan, the air mass came from Bahamas.
15. Describe what an air mass is and what causes it to move. / A huge body of air that has similar temperature, humidity and air pressure at any given height in the atmosphere. The temperature changes in the air masses cause them to move in the atmosphere. / On a warm day our weather comes from a continental tropical air mass.
16. Describe why warm air masses and cold air masses don’t mix. / Due to different densities of warm and cold air, they do not readily mix. /
17. Describe what happens when a warm front moves in and the weather associated with it. / Describe picture weather:Warm air slow moves up and over the cold air mass.
/ How is front represented on weather map?
With Red half circles
18. Draw and Describe what happens when a cold front moves in. / Describe:
Cold fronts move quickly, bring thunderstorms, heavy rain or snow. behind the front is cooler temps / Picture

19. Draw and Describe what happens at stationary front. / Describe:
The air masses stay near each other and bring many days of cloudy wet weather.
/ Picture

20. Draw and Describe what happens at an occluded front. / Describe
Two cold air masses trap a warm air and push it up. It brings cool temps and large amounts of rain and snow. / Picture

21. Explain what a jet stream is and how it influences weather / They are concentrated high altitude streams of fast moving wind which blows from west to east across the northern and southern hemispheres. It is responsible for the movement of major weather features from west to east across north America (and the earth as a whole). /
22. Interpret the weather for a station models. / /