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Articles from Weather Magazine

The Young People’s Special Edition of Weather magazine, edited, written and illustrated by under 21s.

Music

Optics

Climate & Climate Change

Extreme UK weather events

Tropical Weather

Other Weather

Urban Heat Islands

Other relevant background materials for teachers:

Teaching Resources:

Other Useful background information

Uncertainty in Climate Predictions

  • Basics of Climate Prediction
  • From climate4classrooms: How do we make climate predictions?, Why can’t we be sure what happened in the past?, Why are some aspects of climate harder to predict than others?, How can we make a climate prediction when we cant forecast the weather for next month? and Why aren’t climate predictions exact?

Data

Climate Predictions:

Useful Links

Relevant articles

Even the simplest of climate models are not trivial to use, and are best suited to advanced students at KS4 and above.

In the news…

GIS resources

  • The Ozone Hole Tour developed by Cambridge University.
  • Information on the Ozone from the
    British Antarctic Survey  and Jon Shanklin’s ozone page, including up-to-date data as well as more background information.
  • Look here for information from the The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) have forged a unique partnership to provide primary school teachers with practical, hands-on and entertaining curricula material to educate their students about the protective role of the ozone layer and the causes and consequences of its depletion. http://www.unep.fr/ozonaction/information/educationpack.htm
  • Look here for information from the United Nations Environment Programme; teaching younger children in an animated way about the importance of the ozone layer
    http://www.ozzyozone.org/
  • Mario Molina resources on ozone depletion from the RSC.
  • Smog City – a worksheet to guide students through using a simple computer model to investigate the relationship between tropospheric ozone pollution and weather.
  • Some background information from the WMO’s Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion 2006 (click on the ‘twenty questions and answers’ link).
  • UK and European weather and air quality forecasts from Manchester University manunicast.
  • A summary of information about the 2014 Paris Smog
Windows to the Universe introduction to the layers of the Earth’s atmosphere A Pollutant’s Tale – an excellent lecture/ demonstration from the University of Bristol covering the composition and structure of the atmosphere Institute of Physics paper on Atmospheric Stability
A cartoon explaining how satellites monitor the weather from EUMETSAT. Current and archived satellite images from Dundee University (requires free registration) Royal Met Soc Watching the Earth teaching resources for science GCSE. A Met Office lesson plan on Artificial Satellites. You can also download a Met Office poster on satellites. EUMETSAT satellite images Current satellite image showing temperature and cloud cover.
An introduction to Tropical Cyclones from The Met Office. Blown away: the physical facts of hurricanes Harvey and Irma from the Geographical Association’s Teaching Geography magazine. Some useful links about Super typhoon Haiyan/ Yolanda in 2013 and a guide to What Made Typhoon Haiyan so Devastating from Geogarific. Hurricane Katrina Animation A GIS based lesson looking at hurricane tracks and tropical storm risk for KS3/ GCSE geography. An online lesson on Hurricane Isabel (2003) from NGfL Cymru for KS3 geography A YouTube video from the Met Office about tropical cyclones, how they form and their impacts. Hurricane House video from Teachers TV and Hurricane Katrina. Wild Weather: Hurricanes lesson plan and materials (scroll down to the relevant section) Plotting hurricanes using Google Earth – an activity based on Katrina on the GA website. Fox News’ interactive guide to the Saffir-Simpson scale of hurricane strength. Windows to the Universe Hurricanes and Climate practical A simple introduction to hurricanes with a game, from NASA. Disaster Dynamics: Hurricane Landfall a strategy and planning online game for older students. Interactive introduction to African climate zones from Geography Teaching Today A monsoon lesson plan from the Teach India Project Hurricane science and graphics from the University of Rhode Island. COMET programme Introduction to tropical meteorology online textbook and other tropical resources including Hurricane Strike!. In particular, the ‘basics’ section of the Community Hurricane Preparedness module gives a very good introduction to hurricanes and how they develop and can be found at http://www.meted.ucar.edu/hurrican/chp/navmenu.php?tab=2&page=1.0.0 . All COMET modules require free registration. Images of tropical storms from NOAA Simple hurricane and tornado guides from the National Geographic, including ‘build your own’. Links to all sorts of hurricane teaching resources. American National Weather Service guide to tropical weather – Inter Tropical Convergence Zone, Cyclones and El Niño. The available lesson plans are not relevant. El Niño and hurricanes from the University of Illinois (suitable for 16+). Hurricane Hunters El Niño lesson plan for secondary schools from UCAR. El Niño education resources from NOAA. A practical demonstration of El Nino from NASA. A nice El Nino/ La Nina animation from Wycombe High School. A great summary of El Nino and how it affects the rest of the world from Reigate Grammar School. A good explanation from BBC weather in May 2015 and another in September 2015. From the Met Office: some background information , maps of the worldwide impacts of El Nino and La Nina and graphs of the current and forecast states of ENSO. Also a video and a blog about the start of the 2015 El Nino event. Some images of the Atacama desert in bloom following the start of the 2015 El Nino related rains. Also see the relevant articles from the Royal Met Soc ‘Weather’ magazine (suitable for 16+)
Urban wind flow: PowerPoint presentation (need link) introducing how the wind is affected by urban structures and notes for teachers introducing simple fieldwork which can be carried out in the school grounds, using bubbles. Windows to the Universe simple urban heat island field work The RMetS urban heat island background material and case studies. Articles from Weather magazine about the Urban Heat Islands of London, Manchester, Birmingham and Reading.
eVACuate – a forecasting game/ exercise from the Met Office. Can you keep the inhabitants of Green Island out of danger from an erupting volcano? To learn how volcanic eruptions can affect the climate see this webpage from the National Centre of Atmospheric Research http://eo.ucar.edu/educators/ClimateDiscovery/LIA_lesson8_9.28.05.pdf To find out more about the effects of volcanoes on climate see the webpage from NASA here http://eob.gsfc.nasa.gov/Features/Volcano/ Some background information on the   Climate4Classrooms pages Two COMET modules on volcanic ash and volcanism. These are short self-taught courses which require free registration.
Some articles from Planet Earth: Managing flooding by working with nature, Groundwater: the threat beneath our feet and On the road to resilience in Ethiopia. A nice lesson starter on the water cycle from the Met Office and another good animation on YouTube from Doodle Science. For lesson plans, activities and interactive online games from P1-P7 levels, produced by Scottish Water please see the link below: http://www.scottishwater.co.uk/education/ For four lesson plans on the hydrological cycle and some experiments, from NOAA National Weather Service, please see this link: http://www.srh.weather.gov/jetstream/atmos/hydro.htm A YouTube film showing one water molecule completing the water cycle made by NASA and their water droplet game. Beat the Flood practical challenge from Science in School for KS2/ 3. A one hour tutorial on Climate variability, change and water resources from MetEd (requires free registration). The level is suitable for A level. Current and archived hydrological data
Three lesson plans investigating mid-latitude weather systems including a case study of storm Klaus. Teachers TV looks at the effects of weather on people, for KS3 geography ‘Today’s Forecast’ and at Weather Around the World for KS1/2. An online, interactive lesson going from weather data collection through to forecasting from NGfL Cymru for KS3 geography Some advice on teaching weather forecasting and depressions to KS3 from digital geography. Videos introducing weather forecasting in the UK and how research improves forecasts. To play a weather forecasting game with Barnaby Bear from the BBC see here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/barnabybear/games/weather_report.shtml To learn about weather in general and how weather affects people (aimed at KS1-KS2) see: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/whatisweather/ To see lots of weather and climate related activities from the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research see the following link: http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/teacher_resources/main/activity.html To see what the weather doctor has to say please see here http://www.islandnet.com/~see/weather/doctor.htm Using automatic weather station data to study local weather in the UK. For another good website which has animations and videos to explain weather concepts in a simple way: http://www.youtube.com/weatherschool Weather and climate teaching resources for KS3 from radical geography including ‘postman pat does depressions’. A really nice interactive introduction to weather systems and fronts from NGfL Cymru for KS3 geography or WJEC GCSE geography. To see BBC bitesize explanations of weather systems, synoptic charts, symbols and processes see this link: GCSE bitesize Images from NOAA. A nice animation of global weather patterns can be found here. You can buy a slide chart Weather Cycler at http://www.weathercycler.com/weatherc2.htm target=”_blank” rel=”noopener” or http://wardsci.com/ Anticyclones and Depressions A weather forecasting exercise useful as a fun revision session for A level geography or as a weather club activity. An introduction to weather forecasting from the NCAS DIAMET project.

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