Read chapter 4.1 and outline the reading in your science notebook and include major points and diagrams/tables. You should focus on the following essential questions:
– What is the difference between weather and climate?
– What effect does Earth's rotation have on atmospheric circulation and ocean currents?
– In what ways are atmospheric and oceanic circulation pattern similar? How are they different?
Use the following data (attached) to create an XY Scatter Plot Graph in Excel.
After you create the graph, answer the following questions:
1. Print out the graph and label the four layers of the atmosphere. Use a red pen to show the “pauses”. The tropopause is the area between the troposphere and the stratosphere; the stratopause is between the stratosphere and the mesosphere; and the mesopause is between the mesosphere and the thermosphere.
2. Why does the temperature decrease in the troposphere? Why does temperature in the stratosphere increase? Why does the temperature in the mesosphere decrease? Why does the temperature in the thermosphere increase?
3. Draw the ozone layer on your graph. How does the ozone layer help humans?
4. Does temperature really increase in the thermosphere? What is really going on in the thermosphere? (Hint, what is the definition of temperature?)
5. In which layer of the Earth’s atmosphere do meteors begin to burn up?
6. What gases are found in the troposphere and in what percents are they found?
