Lesson 10 - Recognizing Cloud Formations - Teacher's Guide

Targeted Instructional Objective: Applying scientific strategies to gain further understanding of the natural world

Content Focus: Identifying the scientific components which drive the natural water cycle

Clouds help distribute moisture throughout the global atmosphere and assist in the regulation of global radiation. Condensation, evaporation, altitude and temperatures are all critical elements to how clouds form and what type of formations will be produced

General Instructional Goal: Identify the need for clouds in atmospheric processes and describe the characteristics of cloud formations to analyze their potential for precipitation.

Students evaluate the type of cloud formations produced under various conditions of altitude, temperatures, and atmospheric moisture.

Specific Outcomes:

Upon completion of the lesson, students will be able to:

1) List the stages of the water cycle and explain the processes that form clouds

2) Identify the general characteristics of high, middle and low clouds

3) Explain the various features of clouds within the same class

4) Discuss the implications of the functions of clouds

Lesson Content	Instructional Process
Set	Topic Introduction: (Teacher defined) Suggested preview approaches: 1) The teacher can ask students if they remember imagining shapes in clouds, and then ask for examples of how cloud watching might be a more serious activity for some people, such as farmers, fishermen, pilots, etc.}
Purpose	Identifying stages in the water cycle Identifying the environmental and geographical elements that help shape clouds Matching a cloud's formation to its potential for precipitation 1) Prior to reading, the teacher can ask students to look outside and guess if the clouds they see are rain-bearing formations. At the end of the lesson, the students can see how close they came to the correct answer.
Guided Practice	Teacher may wish to read along with the students, pausing for questions and emphasizing the History section.
Practice/Application	Individual or small groups answer the worksheet questions.
Summary	Synopsis of material covered Optional strategies: 1) Whole group spot check of data answers. 2) Mini vocabulary quiz, Jeopardy style, to reinforce the names of clouds.
Evaluation	Recommended score of at least 85% on worksheet to ensure student readiness for subsequent lessons.

Necessary Materials:

Collage Materials, if selected for activity

Student worksheet

Supplemental/Cross Curricular Activities and Ideas

Collage of Clouds: Comparing individual clouds within the major classes

Small Group Activity turns clouds into an art form as students cut and paste cloud pictures to create collages of one specific formation or class. Student photographers could even apply their own camera skills to snapping colorful shots for creatively titled works; for example, Altostratus at Dawn. Truly serious student artists could even personify cloud characteristics with human or cartoon renditions of each cloud's "personality" or "emotional state," depicting an altocumulus, for example, as an overstuffed, puffy-cheeked cherub lazily meandering about in a blue sky.

Clouds in a Hurry: The technology of cloud watching

Inviting a local television weatherperson to talk to the class about clouds and precipitation in the area can be seriously cool when the guest also brings in videos taped with time elapse cameras which show clouds developing at high speed. Students can watch hours of clouds gathering, darkening, rolling, exchanging lightening, pouring rain, and finally dispersing, in a matter of ten to fifteen minutes of class time.

Poetry In Air: Synthesizing facts as creative expression

Individual students can weave the fundamentals of cloud formations into verse, using metaphors, similes, and other techniques of imagery to express emotions often associated with clouds. Poems can be limited to certain topics, restricted in format, or completely unstructured at the teacher's discretion. Student interpretation of poems may require that readers identify any factual mistakes; for example, the poet who describes giggling laughter as "the lighthearted dance of the soft white Nimbostratus sailing through the sky" has made a factual, though creative, error.

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