Lesson 5

1 min: talk through EQs

2 mins: creeping hazard because has a long period of onset (ie. several years), so hard to know if drought has
begun or if it’s just a dry period.

5 mins: types of drought. NB. Meteorological = to do with atmosphere and the weather.

2 mins: what are the social, economic, environmental impacts? NB. Food scarcity can lead to war.

5 mins: What are the physical factors that can cause drought?
1. lack of rain. Could be short term, could be due to longer term climate change. Can occur at different
scales.
2. Mismanagement of water resources.
3. Climate change = more evaporation

10 mins: ENSO. Get them to explain it to each other in pairs. Watch video, then get them to explain again to
see if that has clarified things. Then get them to demonstrate it just through actions.
Give them diagram and tell them to look closely. I will test them on this at end of lesson. KEEP UP PACE!!

5 mins: who is affected how? Quick notetaking exercise.

5 mins: the jet stream. Watch video and get to take notes. Keep this simple.

5 mins: isobars.

Isobars are lines joining points of equal pressure, similar to contours, which are shown on weather charts.
Charts showing isobars are useful because they can help to identify anticyclones and depressions. Pressure is
measured in millibars and isobars are normally drawn at intervals of 4 millibars. Pressure values are
corrected to Mean Sea Level Pressure (MSLP) before being plotted on a map, this ensures that altitude does
not affect the mapping.

closer isobars mean stronger winds; the wind blows almost parallel to the isobars; in the northern
hemisphere, the wind blows round a depression in an anticlockwise direction and around an anticyclone in a
clockwise direction. In the southern hemisphere, the opposite is true; winds around anticyclones can
sometimes be even stronger than indicated by the isobars; in warm air, the wind is relatively steady and
tends to blow at about two-thirds the speed that the chart would suggest, though there are exceptions to
this ; in cold air, the wind is usually as strong as indicated by the isobars and can be very gusty.

5 mins: air pressure. Explain.

- Anticyclones are areas of high pressure, whose centres are often less well defined than depressions, and are
associated with quiet, settled weather. Winds blow in a clockwise direction around anticyclones in the
northern hemisphere, this is reversed in the southern hemisphere.
- Depressions are areas of low pressure, usually with a well-defined centre, and are associated with unsettled
weather. Winds blow in an anticlockwise direction around depressions in the northern hemisphere, this is
reversed in the southern hemisphere.

5 mins: fronts

5 mins: explain meteorological symbols etc.

5 mins: make forecast prediction.

10 mins: worksheet

5 mins: symbols quiz

2 mins: summarise

5 mins: draw diagrams of el nino and la nina and hand in (named) on the way out.