What's Your Weather Like?
Celebrating Our Differences, Exploring Our Similarities
By Kris Vassos & Gayle Berthiaume
Guiding Questions
Objectives
Materials / Resources
Websites
Literature
Engaging and Effective Activities
Assessment
Extension / Enrichment Activities
Differentiation Strategies
Connections
Guiding Questions
- • How are people around the world alike?
• How are people around the world different?
• What are the different climates around the world?
• How does climate affect how people live?
Objectives
- • Students will explore climates around the world.
• Students will explain weather changes and patterns by measurable quantities.
• Students will understand why climate differs due to location.
Materials / Resources
- • Pages Country information sheet
• Pages Climate information sheet
• Pages Climate graph
• Computer
• iLife [http://www.apple.com/ilife/]
• iWork [http://www.apple.com/iwork]
• Safari [http://www.apple.com/macosx/apps/#safari]
• Dashboard Weather Widget [http://www.apple.com/macosx/apps/all.html#dashboard]
Websites
- • Google Earth [http://earth.google.com]
• Google Maps [http://map.google.com]
• CIA - The World Factbook [https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html]
Literature
- • Who Cares About the Weather? by Melvin Berger and Natalie Lunis
• Weather Words and What They Mean by Gail Gibbons
• What Will the Weather Be Like Today? by Paul Rogers
Engaging and Effective Activities
- 1. Read Who Cares About the Weather? by Melvin Berger and Natalie Lunis or another appropriate book that you may have available. Ask students to brainstorm words related to weather. Make a list of student responses. Ask students how location might create different weather patterns. Create a KWL chart of what students know and what they would like to learn about weather around the world. Ask students how they might go about learning about weather, both locally and globally. Use Pages or Kidspiration to create the KWL chart. Other questions may include:
- • What is climate?
• How does climate affect how people live?
• What type of clothing is worn in different climates?
• Does a country have only one type of climate? Why or why not?
• What causes climates to change?
• Ask students to predict the climate for different places around the world.
2. Inform the class they will be researching different climates around the world.
3. Have each student choose a different country. (Prior to the lesson, place a copy of the Country Climate chart where students can access it, such as on a server.
4. Students will be collecting weather data for the capital of their assigned country. Assess student knowledge of capitals.
- • What is the capital of a country?
• How does it differ from other cities in the country?
5. Students will be completing the Country information sheet. When students complete this information sheet, they will be researching information that can be used for different activities. This lesson only uses part of the research. Teachers can have students complete only the portion of the information sheet needed for this lesson or the entire sheet.
6. Have students open Safari.
7. First students will go to CIA - The World Factbook and choose their country from the pop-up menu. A map of the country will be at the top of the page with the capital indicated by a star. Other information will be listed by category further down on the page. Students will complete their information sheet based on this information.
8. Next, have the students click the Dashboard icon on the Dock and select the weather widget. Click the i (for information) in the lower-right corner of the weather widget. The widget will flip over, allowing the student to type the city name. If there is more than one with the same name, a list will appear allowing the student to select their city. The “Include lows for 6 day forecast” box should be checked. Click Done. Now the widget is set for their city and country.
9. Students will open Pages and enter the information in the Pages Climate graph. The graph will reflect the highs and lows and temperature differences.
10. Using Google Earth or Google Maps, have students find the location of their country and its capital. Each student should know the continent and the hemisphere where their country is located.
11. Discuss the temperature highs and lows for the different countries. Which country had the highest temperature? Which country had the lowest temperature? Where are the cities located in regard to the hemispheres and continents? What difference does location make in temperature? Do cities in the same hemisphere have the same type of climate? Why or why not? What is the difference of each day’s highs and lows? Do certain countries have more of a difference? Why? What type of clothing do students think people wear in that country?
12. At this point the teacher can choose to end the lesson and complete the assessment or to continue and assess at the end of the year.
13. If continuing, once a month, have students track their country’s temperature.
14. At the end of the year, students can summarize what they have discovered about their country’s climate at the end of their Pages Climate graph.
Assessment
- • Response to the pre and post lesson questions
• Mathematical computation of Climate Information Sheet (if done by hand)
• Completion of Country Climate graph
• End of year report
• Teacher observation
Extension / Enrichment Activities
- • Combine this activity with other My World + Your World = One World lessons and have students create an iPhoto book or podcast report based on their research.
• Students can become weather reporters and create a weather iMovie project or podcasts.
Differentiation Strategies
- • Students can be paired to assist one another.
• Universal Access can be used to help students who need assistive technologies. (If students have difficulty reading, have them highlight words, hold down the Control key, click the highlighted words and choose the Start Speaking command to have the words read to the student.)
Connections
- • Student to World Connection - Students learn about different climates around the world and how location affects climate.