Arctic Cold Front Time Lapse (Now with Temperatures)

Contributor
Brendan Loy
Type Category
Instructional Materials
Types
Animation/Movie , Phenomenon
Note
This resource, vetted by NSTA curators, is provided to teachers along with suggested modifications to make it more in line with the vision of the NGSS. While not considered to be "fully aligned," the resources and expert recommendations provide teachers with concrete examples and expert guidance using the EQuIP rubric to adapted existing resources. Read more here.

Reviews

Description

This 1 ½ minute video shows the phenomenon of a cold front moving through Denver, CO over the course of a day in November. The time lapse video shows the time of day and temperatures.

The resource can be used as either a phenomena to engage students at the beginning of a lesson or an assessment of student understanding.

It could stimulate the following driving questions:

●     What changes in weather conditions occurred throughout the day?

●     How do the motions of air masses result in changes in weather conditions?

●     How does the passing of the cold front affect the development and pattern of clouds? (Names of clouds are not required at the MS level, but clouds develop throughout and produce precipitation by the end of the video.)

Intended Audience

Educator
Educational Level
  • Middle School
  • Grade 6
  • Grade 7
  • Grade 8
Language
English
Access Restrictions

Free access - The right to view and/or download material without financial, registration, or excessive advertising barriers.

Performance Expectations

MS-ESS2-5 Collect data to provide evidence for how the motions and complex interactions of air masses results in changes in weather conditions.

Clarification Statement: Emphasis is on how air masses flow from regions of high pressure to low pressure, causing weather (defined by temperature, pressure, humidity, precipitation, and wind) at a fixed location to change over time, and how sudden changes in weather can result when different air masses collide. Emphasis is on how weather can be predicted within probabilistic ranges. Examples of data can be provided to students (such as weather maps, diagrams, and visualizations) or obtained through laboratory experiments (such as with condensation).

Assessment Boundary: Assessment does not include recalling the names of cloud types or weather symbols used on weather maps or the reported diagrams from weather stations.

This resource was not designed to build towards this performance expectation, but can be used to build towards it using the suggestions provided below.

Comments about Including the Performance Expectation
This resource can be used to help students develop an understanding of the changes in temperature, precipitation and cloud cover associated with an approaching cold front. The teacher will need to emphasize how air masses flow from regions of high pressure to low pressure, causing weather defined by temperature, pressure, humidity, precipitation, and wind.

Science and Engineering Practices

This resource was not designed to build towards this science and engineering practice, but can be used to build towards it using the suggestions provided below.

Comments about Including the Science and Engineering Practice
Students watching the time lapse video will notice that the temperature drops throughout the day, the cloud cover thickens, and it begins to snow. This should lead the students to wonder what atmospheric conditions caused this change in the weather. Their questions might include: Why did the temperature keep going down? Why do the clouds change the way they look? Why did it snow a little bit?

Disciplinary Core Ideas

This resource was not designed to build towards this disciplinary core idea, but can be used to build towards it using the suggestions provided below.

Comments about Including the Disciplinary Core Idea
The time lapse video could be used either as a phenomenon to pique student interest when starting a unit or as an assessment for one of the resources in the NSTA hub on air masses - http://ngss.nsta.org/Resource.aspx?ResourceID=23 or http://ngss.nsta.org/Resource.aspx?ResourceID=750. The teacher will need to use other resources (globes, maps of air masses (http://www.srh.weather.gov/srh/jetstream/synoptic/airmass.html, etc.) to address the part of the Disciplinary Core Idea concerning how weather and climate are influenced by interactions involving sunlight, the ocean, the atmosphere and that these interactions vary with latitude, altitude, and local and regional geography.

Crosscutting Concepts

This resource was not designed to build towards this crosscutting concept, but can be used to build towards it using the suggestions provided below.

Comments about Including the Crosscutting Concept
The quickly moving cold front causes changes in the weather conditions. The arctic air mass drops the temperature rapidly and brings limited precipitation indicating the air mass moved south out of Canada into Colorado.

Resource Quality

  • Alignment to the Dimensions of the NGSS: - none -

  • Instructional Supports: - none -

  • Monitoring Student Progress: - none -

  • Quality of Technological Interactivity: - none -