WEEKLY REVIEW

We started the week off with a meeting more specifically ..a Protocol! On Monday we learned all about the Kyoto Protocol and what it aimed to do in addition to this we learned that not all countries were equal when it came to this. We then moved on to global warming which was quite strange as I was feeling pretty cold that day!We talked much about the consequences of global warming such as...

• Polar ice caps melting
• Glaciers melting
• Sea levels rising
• Changed Precipitation Patterns

Then on Tuesday we learned all about malnutrition and under nutrition and how they were different. For instance under nutrition is when an individual does not have enough food to eat however malnutrition is when an individual might not be eating the right things. we also learned about over nutrition which is rapidly becoming a problem in the United States. After learning about the various forms of nutrition we discussed diet patterns, both globally and national  We learned that in both cases Grain is the most important nutrient source that people consume. What i found interesting however was the fact that 40 pounds of grain would only be equivalent to 2 pounds of meat! We then learned about the green revolution and its impact on human society, and its core concepts...

• Mechanization
• Fertilization
• Irrigation

We were halfway through the week when we had to take a test... a test that i feel i did REALLY bad on :)

By Thursday we started learning about the individual aspects of the green revolution. We also learned about economies of scale and how the United States is one of them. In addition to all of this we learned about various farming techniques such as mono-cropping and the use of fertilizer. 

We closed the week with a reading test and some more information on farming...In Mr  Kite's absence i can say that on behalf of the class that we were all working very diligently, and silently for the duration of the period. :)

Weekley Reporter INCOMPLETE PLEASE IGNORE

What a week this has been... We statrteed the week off by learning about the various types of chemicals    such as....

we got to learn all of these pollutantss by designing supervillian characters with special abilitys that reflected each of the chemicals effects. We then talked about photochemical smog and thermal inversions, more specificly how they each affect citys air health  In addition to this we also learned about acid rain/deposition (why do people have to make things complicated?)
Then we learneda about various forms of pollution control systems such as baghouse filters, Electrostatic Percepitators, and bed combustion. In additon to other more conventional methoeds such as using a scrubbers. The class found these methoeds of ollutin control very facinating.

Then on the 10th we started learning about ozone and its benefits/harmful effects depending on the location of the ozone.

WEEKLY BLOG

BLOG:

This week in earth environmental science:

We had a long 4-day holiday so we arrived on school on Tuesday. The entire student body was refreshed and ready for a week of learning!

The week started with a discussion about what would happen if the earth was not tilted on its axis?  The class produced some enthusiastic answers. Soon we began with our lesson for that day - an overview/summary of the layers of the atmosphere and their significance. They are as follows:

Troposphere: where weather occurs, most dense

Stratosphere: contains UV blocking Ozone layer

Mesosphere: second layer - less dense then the stratosphere

Thermosphere: blocks x-ray radiation, where the aurora light occur

Exosphere: least dense layer

After learning about the atmosphere we began talking about the formation of Hadley cells (A large-scale atmospheric convection cell in which air rises at the equator and sinks at medium latitudes).  We closed out the day with a discussion of the Intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) and how an area within that zone would have increased rainfall.

 On Wednesday we began by learning about the corealis winds: Coriolis effect is a deflection of moving objects when they are viewed in a rotating reference frame.  We then did a lab to show the class the effects of the winds: we used a turntable and markers to draw the trajectories of the “lines across the globe”, it was fun and exciting!   We also began talking bout “el Niño and La Nina” a result of the corealis effect they are changes in the direction of currents/wind. We saw how gyers (large pacific ocean currents affect the temperature of water, and upwelling:  a phenomenon that allows nutrient rich water to flow from the bottom of the ocean to the surface (good for fish) we also saw the effects that El Niño and la Nina had on countries and people.

On Thursday we watched a video describing the process of rain shadow. Most of the class time was spent by learning about the similarities of different organism in various biomes, despite may of the organism not being genetically related they all seemed to form similar adaptations to survive their special climates.

Finally at the end of the week we discussed and learned about ecosystems evenness and ecosystem richness. More specifically we learned how to calculate the richness of an area by using Shannon’s index… a long and complicated formula.  Thus ends another productive week in the classroom of Mr. Kite! My horizon and knowledge-sphere has certainly gone to the next level J

Citations: 
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