Climate vs Weather PDF

Curriculum Connection Name: ________________________ 7 ES.1 Understanding Climate: A Bigger Picture of Weather Climate is about patterns of weather over a long time. It takes into account various factors like temperature, ra...

Curriculum Connection Name: ________________________ 7 ES.1 Understanding Climate: A Bigger Picture of Weather Climate is about patterns of weather over a long time. It takes into account various factors like temperature, rainfall, wind speed, and humidity. For instance, if an area receives a lot of rain throughout the year, we'd say it has a wet climate. If it's often hot, we'd say it has a hot climate. We also use words like tropical, desert, and polar to describe different types of climates. Weather vs. Climate: What's the Difference? Many people confuse weather with climate, but they are not the same. Weather describes the conditions of the atmosphere over a short period of time, such as hours or days. For example, it could be sunny one day and rainy the next. On the other hand, climate tells us what kind of weather is typical in a place over many years. If you live in a desert, for example, you'd expect it to be hot and dry most of the time - that's your climate. Examples of Describing Climate vs. Weather Describing Weather: "Today is rainy and cold." "The sun is shining brightly this afternoon." "It's windy outside, make sure to wear your hat." Describing Climate: "Our city has a hot, dry climate. We hardly see rain." "We live in a tropical climate. It's usually hot and humid all year." © Super Simple Sheets supersimplesheets.com  Curriculum Connection Name: ________________________ 13 ES.1 Understanding Our Air The air we breathe is a mix of different gases! It is made up of 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, and 1% of other gases like carbon dioxide, argon, helium, hydrogen, and ozone. Nitrogen is used by plants to make protein, and we humans and animals need oxygen to breathe. The oxygen we use up is replaced by the oxygen plants produce, maintaining a critical balance. If we cut down too many trees, we could disrupt this balance, affecting our air quality. The Greenhouse Effect Have you ever seen a greenhouse? It's a glass building used to grow plants in cold weather. The Sun's heat can enter, but it can't escape, keeping the greenhouse warm. The same thing happens on Earth due to greenhouse gases. What Are Greenhouse Gases? The most known greenhouse gases are carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide. These gases work like the glass walls of a greenhouse, letting in sunlight and trapping some heat to keep our planet warm. The more greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, the thicker the glass walls, which warms our planet. What Can We Do? But here's the problem: when we humans do things like burning fossil fuels (like when we drive cars or run factories), raising lots of cattle, or cutting down trees, we add more greenhouse gases to our atmosphere. This means more heat gets trapped, leading to global warming and climate change. © Super Simple Sheets supersimplesheets.com