AdvancedAtmosphere Activities  For Advanced Atmosphere Lessons: Storm Chasing Focus on Hurricane Andrew Moving Air Masses Project 1 Project 2 Project 3 Answer keys

The students, working in groups, will create a fictitious weather report for a storm or other extreme weather event that is currently striking their local town.  The storm can be any of the following:
a) Hurricane
b) Tornadoes (or strong thunderstorms)
c) Blizzard (or strong winter storms)
d) Incredibly hot or cold temperature spell
e) Drought or Flood conditions

The weather report should include weather maps (state or local) showing your town.  The weather map can be created on paper, or can be created on the computer using the proper software. These maps should beinclude all of the proper weather symbols that are usually found around the storm of choice.  These maps should include (but not be limited to) showing:

1. pressure centers and isobars
2. wind speed and direction
3. air temperature and dew point temperature
4. wind chill temperature (if a blizzard is chosen)
5. cloud cover

Map activity 1:
 

The first map activity will use a weather map of the United States from June 18th, 1998. The students are to study the map, then answer the questions on the student worksheet.  View the:  a) larger map b) printable map for students (for best results, a color laser printer is desirable)  c) student worksheet d) teacher answer key You may wish the to have the students view the map on the computer (using the larger map), rather than printing out the map, when they work on this activity.  If they have trouble with some of the symbols, they can refer to the symbol maps in the Storm Chasing Activity.

Extension to Map activity 1: Have the students go to the Purdue Weather Processor and download or view today's composite satellite map.  Then, they can:
a) answer the same questions (or as many that apply) on the student worksheet, only using the current map; and/or
b) working as individuals or in groups, have them create their own weather worksheet questions.  Not only must they come up with the questions, but they must know the answers as well!
 

Map activity 2:
Using the following map, tell everything about it that you can for the state of Montana:
 

This activity will use the map of Montana on the right.  It shows the weather reported by 7 Montana stations and one North Dakota station on June 17th, 1998.  The students will use and study this map to answer questions on the student worksheet.  The Montana cities used in this activity are:  Billings       Bozeman       Glasgow        Great Falls       Havre  Kalispell    Miles City  The North Dakota city:   Williston  student worksheet answer key If they have trouble with some of the symbols, they can refer to the symbol maps in the Storm Chasing Activity.

Extension to Map activity 2: Using the Purdue Weather Processor, have the students view a surface map of your local region. Working as individuals or in groups, have them create their own weather worksheet questions about their region or state.  Not only must they come up with the questions, but they must know the answers as well!

There are several conversions between systems of measurement that the students will encounter when dealing with weather phenomena.  This project will focus on two of them: converting temperatures from Fahrenheit to Celsius, and coverting wind speed from knots to miles per hour.

Activity 1: Temperature conversion:

Since most of the world uses the Celsuis temperature scale, it should be important for students to know the difference between the two scales.  This is probably more important to students that may travel to foreign countries, or to those who live close to the Mexican or Canadian borders.  Although the conversion formulas will be given and used in the exercises, it is not the goal of this exercise to have the students memorize the formulas.  Rather, they should develop a basic familiarity with the Celsuis temperature scale, enough familiarity with it to know what the temperature readings basically mean.  The worksheet provided will first give a very basic introduction into the scales and formulas, then it proceeds with conversion questions, some using the United States map from map activity #1.  For another explanation and good information, check this USA Today link.  Printing out the temperature scale found at this site and handing it out to the students may help further the explanation.

student worksheet
answer key

When the students finish this exercise, they should be able to recognize a few temperature points on the Celsius scale.  For example they should know that 0 C is freezing (32 degrees F) and that 100 C is boiling (212 degrees F).  But, a few other "neat" temperatures should be shown and understood as well.  For example, 4 C is approximately 40 F; 16 C is approximately 61 F (the numbers reverse themselves); the body's normal temperature (98.6 F) is 37 C; and 28 C is 82 F (again, the numbers reverse themselves).  If they can keep all of these in mind, they will have a basic understanding of the Celsius scale.

Some temperature conversion calculators can be found on the Internet as well.  Here are just a few sites:
 

Perfectly Useless Software's Temperature Converter	Conversion Chart
National Weather Service (Buffalo, NY)	Temperature Conversion from El Paso's NWS

Activity 2: Wind speed conversion:

Wind speed on most weather maps is usually measured in knots, as is the speed of most aircraft and ocean-going vessels.  Knowing how to convert from knots to miles per hour is a useful skill when trying to read some weather maps, such as the maps we have been working with in our activites.  For a quick explanation, see this activity designed by NASA.  The worksheet provided will first give a quick explanation of miles per hour vs. knots, then ask some questions for the student to fill out, using the above map from map activity #1.

student worksheet
answer key

The students should get the general idea that 1 knot is about 1.15 miles per hour.  This will allow for some simple approximations that they can memorize.  They should be able to remember that 10 knots is 11.5 mph, 20 knots is approximately 23 mph, 40 knots is approximately 46 mph, 60 knots is approximately 69 mph, and so on.

Student Worksheets:

printable map for Map activity #1	Map activity #2	Wind Speed conversion activity
student worksheet for Map activity #1	Temperature conversion activity	`

Answer Keys:

Multiple choice activity	Matching weather symbols activity
Map activity #1	Temperature conversion activity
Map activity #2	Wind Speed conversion activity