Atmosphere Characteristics

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reated by: Christy Dion Paulding County High School Dallas, Georgia

Weather vs. Climate

How might you distinguish the difference between weather and climate? (answer now!!!) After viewing the clip, revisit your answer. Is it the same? Is it different? Explain why.

Primary Components of the atmosphere (review)

Nitrogen makes up about 78%, oxygen 21%, and the remaining 1% consists of gases such as water vapor, carbon dioxide, argon and a number of other gases.

Water vapor is the source of all clouds and precipitation. Like carbon dioxide, water vapor absorbs heat just like carbon dioxide.

Ozone(**)

If the ozone did not filter most UV radiation, and all of the sun's UV rays reached the surface of Earth, our planet would be uninhabitable for many living organisms.

Humans contribute to harmful pollutants that are a threat to our ozone layer.

Thermosphere (85 to 500 km) This layer has 2 layers. Lower is the ionosphere thermosphere is the highest and has the highest temperatures (up to 800 degrees Celsius) Mesosphere (50 km to 85 km) This layer is where meteors can be seen, which are sometimes called shooting stars. It protects earth's surface from being hit by "most" meteoroids. It is cold temperature-wise with -90 degrees Celsius Stratosphere (10 km to 50 km) this layer contains the ozone layer which protects Earth from the Sun's harmful rays. The lower layer is cold (-60 degrees Celsius) and the upper is warm b/c the ozone absorbs heat, warming the air. The ozone layer is between the lower and upper stratosphere lay ers.

The Troposphere (0-10 km), lowest layer, the one we live in, contains 99% of the water vapor and 75% of atmospheric gases. Rain, snow, and clouds occur in this layer (which is weather).*As altitude increases, temperature decreases. (Very top is -60 degrees Celsius)

Place the images below in the appropriate layer of the atmosphere.

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KEY

Atmosphere Foldable

Based on the information that you learned so far, complete the foldable according to the directions.

Click on picture for a link to the foldable document and instructions.

Questions for Foldable: 1. What are the four main layers?

2.

What are the two sublayers that we’ve learned about?

3. List whether temperature increases or decreases for each of the 4 layers.

4. List the different things found in each layer (such as weather, airplane, etc.) 5. Which layer is most important to you and why?

6. What two layers protect us from things? What does it protect us from?

7.

What’s the height in km for each of the 4 layers?

8. What is the coldest layer? The warmest layer?

9. Describe the temperature below the ozone layer and above the ozone layer.

10. Describe the two sublayers within the thermosphere.

Heating of the Atmosphere

Energy Transfer as Heat What Happens to Solar Radiation?

Energy Transfer as Heat

Essential Question: In what ways might heat energy travel?

Conduction is the transfer of heat through matter by molecular motion. Heat is transferred by the collision from one molecule to another. It flows from high to low Click on image for energy transfer video rap clip.

Convection is the transfer of heat by mass movement or circulation within a substance. It takes place in fluids like ocean and air, and solids like the Earth's mantle, which behaves like a fluid over long Unlike conduction and convection, which need materials to travel through the vacuum of space.

Radiation

How does heat travel, identify the process?

Click on the flashing images to begin.

Electromagnetic Spectrum Radiation

All objects at any temperature, emit radiant energy.

Hotter objects radiant more energy per unit area than colder objects do.

Four laws of Radiation The hottest radiating bodies produce the shortest wavelengths of maximum radiation.

Objects that are good absorbers of radiation, are good emitters as well.

The sun is the ultimate source of energy that creates our weather. The sun emits light, heat, and UV rays. These forms of energy are all part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

What happens to solar radiation?

When radiation strikes an object, there usually are three different results.

1) Some energy is absorb by the object.

2) Substances such as water and air are transparent to certain wavelengths of radiation.

3) Some radiation may bounce off an object without being absorbed or transmitted.

Reflection occurs when an electromagnetic wave bounces off an object. The reflected wave has the same intensity as the incident wave.

Reflection Scattering produces a larger number of weaker rays that scatter in all Scattering directions.

About 50 percent of the solar energy that strikes the top of the earth's atmosphere reaches Earth's surface and is absorbed. Most of this is re-radiated toward the Photo synthesis

Use the labels below to correctly identify the types of rays shown.

Reflection Refraction Scattering Absorption

Day Two - Practice Summary

Click on image to left to access practice worksheet on thermal energy.

Ticket out the Door: Lesson Nutshell - in 3-5 sentences explain how this lesson relates to the lesson standards.

Temperature Controls

Earth Systems Georgia Performance Standard: SES5b. Explain the relationship of air masses and surfaces over which they form.

Earth's Temperature

Essential Question: What factors might control the Earth's temperature?

Click on the image to see a depiction of what is going to occur if we do not start thinking about our environment.

Why Temperatures Vary

Factors other than latitude that exert a strong influence on temperature include heating of land and water, altitude, geographic position, cloud cover, and ocean more rapidly and to cooler temperatures than water.

Water Locations where oceans winds blow inland opposed to towards the ocean, will have considerably different temperatures. The first will have cool summers and mild What affects temperatures? Click to see a short clip.

Land that is higher in elevation will have cooler more moderate temperatures.

Altitude Albedo is the fraction of total radiation that is reflected by Cover Albedo and therefore reflect a significant amount of the sunlight that strikes them.

World Distribution of Temperature

Isotherms are lines that connect points that have the same temperature. This map emphasizes the importance of latitude as a control on incoming solar radiation, which in turn heats the Earth's surface and the atmosphere above it.

Day 3: Practice and Summary

Practice: Read pages 494 - 495; How the Earth Works - Earth's Atmosphere. Complete the five discussion questions on page 495.

Closing Ticket Out the Door: Explain how today's lesson relates to the standard.

Resources

1) Wikipedia.org

2) Google images 3) Youtube.com

4) "Layer This" - H. Frey - smart exchange 5) Tarbuck Lutgens. Georgia Earth Science. Pearson Education, 2009.

Attachments Layers of the Atmosphere Foldable.pdf

Transfer of Thermal Energy worksheet.doc