Tom Keller

7-5-03

SLM 521

“Web Dropin #5”

Introduction –

Throughout history, the climate of a region has played a great role in shaping all aspects of any ecosystem. Significant changes in temperature and precipitation has often greatly changed ecosystems. For example, northwest Africa was once a dense tropical rain forest and is largely a barren desert. This was due to the formation of mountain ranges from shifts in tectonic plates that greatly changed precipitation patterns in the region.

By studying temperature and precipitation in a region, trends can be noticed and sometimes measures can be taken to avoid disasters such as floods and droughts. In this activity, you will be reading temperature and precipitation data for the United States, as well as creating graphs and maps using an online resource. These graphs and maps will indicate climate changes that have occurred in various areas of the U.S. in the past 118 years. Now, over such a short time, there will be no rain forests turning into deserts, however, this activity serves as a model to show how such short term and long term climate studies can be conducted.

Information –

Students will access the following website:

HYPERLINK "http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/USclimate/"

United States Interactive Climate Pages -

http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/USclimate/

This website contains extensive resources regarding the climate of the U.S. since 1895. It contains background information about climate and how to study climates, tons of information and charts about the history of U.S. climate, as well as great interactive resources in which you will make map plots and charts indicating precipitation and temperature in the U.S.

These charts can be used in a variety of ways, including making maps of average climates, making maps comparing average climates between regions and time periods, and making graphs showing average and extreme temperatures and precipitation in areas over any time period.

Now this sounds complicated, but since the website does most of the mapping and graph making, it’s not too difficult. Your job is to find interesting facts and trends that have occurred in the climate of the U.S. in recent history (since 1895).

Activity –

Once you access the site, the first thing you will need to do is learn about climate and how it is researched. Go the “Home” to begin (at the top of the page), and then navigate through the site to read this information. Take brief notes on key concepts about temperature, precipitation, and research involved with climates to turn in later.

When you feel you have a basic understanding of climates and what this site has to offer from navigating around it for about 15-20 minutes, you will begin to create graphs and maps. Return to the Interactive Climate Pages URL listed above, and experiment with the specific city graphs, U.S. climate maps, and information pages.

These resources allow you to create maps, graphs, and charts about climate in individual states, cities, and the entire United States.

Due to the vast amount of possibilities here to study, I will assign each of you to research a certain aspect of U.S. or regional climate. Then I will explain to you exactly which resource you will need to access in order to most easily attain your information.

Once you obtain your graphs, maps, and charts, print them out and indicate any interesting trends or observations you can find about precipitation and temperature. Using the graphical data you create, it should be simple to notice trends compared to how difficult it would be to make such observations by only looking at series of numbers. We then will display our maps, charts, and graphs along with what we found interesting about them in a poster form.

http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/USclimate/

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Tom Keller

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http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/USclimate/

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