Science Classroom Connection

Students will create a graphic organizer that is based upon thunderstorms, lightning, tornadoes, and hurricanes. Students will identify a series of characteristics of each (with a minimum of 5), and then explain the best course of action to be safe during each of these severe weather conditions.

Note that this assignment will be evaluated as an equivalent of two formative assignments, i.e., instead of the standard five (5) points, it will count for ten (10) points. Furthermore, the student will receive a raw score on said work and then converted to the ten (10) points score.

Example: If a student earns 18/24, then this score will be equated to 7.5/10 since 18/24=X/10 results in X=7.5

Students will be evaluated upon the characteristics of air masses and their formations of various types of fronts that bring about changes in our daily weather.

Students are highly advised to study their class notes, their study guides that include the main ideas in their double journal entries, directed reading, and Section 2 review questions.

Students will learn about the four kinds of air masses and the four types of fronts that affect our daily weather. We will elaborate upon high pressure in relation to low pressure as the weather changes over time.

Furthermore, students will read, write, and orally discuss the major ideas on this topic and reflect upon them as they complete their double journal entries.

Students will learn the different types of clouds based upon their characteristics (shape and internal structure), and we will reinforce them in class as we move forward with our new material.

If you were to look at the StudentConnect/ParentConnect, you will see a score of “999”. This merely represents that the introduction has been completed by the student; otherwise, you may see a score of zero that signals failure on the student’s part to take an active role in the learning process to write the introduction of the paper for this marking period! After today, a student may still write the introduction for partial credit only, “555”, if he or she has not done so thus far!

We will be starting our work on the body of the paper this Thursday, immediately after the test on the atmosphere.

Students will be evaluated on the characteristics of the atmosphere, atmospheric heating, and global and local winds that we have discussed and reinforced in class for the past couple of weeks.

Students are highly advised to prepare by reviewing their study guides that were given for each small section along with any other reinforcement that we may have done in class as well.

This test will be a short one due to our continuous focus on the writing process that will resume immediately after our short test.

Students are to complete answering the following questions on pages 30 & 31 in their notebooks: 

7-14; 17-19; 21-26.

NOTE: For those who did not have their introduction verified, it will be checked throughout this week as we move forward in our material on weather and climate.

In addition to commencing the review process on the atmosphere for our chapter test this week (Wednesday or Thursday), students will start their writing process with the focus on writing the introduction of their paper that will center on weather and climate. Like it was mentioned in class earlier, a 20-25 minute block will be set aside for this learning portion going forward!

Remember that this is classwork, NOT HOMEWORK, which means that it has to be done in front of your teacher. I will not be grading mom, dad, brother, sister, or any other relative or source. If I suspect plagiarism, a possiblitity of grade zero may be earned per our classroom contract procedure given to you in the beginning of the school year and signed by you and your legal guardian!

Students will have an opportunity to learn about the writing process in terms of writing a five-paragraph essay using the standard format of an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

The teacher will guide the students as to how to proceed with an introduction using a “hook” to grab the readers’ attention, and then transition into the thesis statement (the topic) to be discussed and developed in the body of the paper. The instructor will demonstrate how to develop a paragraph through the breakdown of the thesis statement and support it through details and examples. Finally, a short paragraph will serve to sum up the thesis statement based on its discussion and its development throughout the paper.

Students will eventually be required to follow a similar format based on our topic of Weather and Climate as this assignment will gradually draw to a close toward the end of the current marking period. Note that we will work on this paper in class (classwork) paragraph by paragraph through incremental time. When the work is completed, students will have an opportunity to type the final piece of work to be handed in at a scheduled period of time.

Students are highly advised to study their class notes on the characteristics of the atmosphere along with its heating processes since we will be having a summative evaluation late next week, and students should not wait until test time to start studying and have to cram unnecessarily.