Math in the World: Weather
Aim: How do we use math when tracking the weather?
Objective: On a daily basis, students will use
mathematical concepts to track the weather.
Note: This lesson is an on-going
lesson. Each day, students will track
the weather and compile mathematical information. The lesson should take about 5-10 minutes of
your class’ day.
Materials: Internet
Do Now: Students
will look up the weather on the internet.
http://weather.com
This is
the all-inclusive weather site! Students can find out the current
weather of their hometown as well as anywhere in the world. There
is a plethora of information pertaining to any aspect of the weather
and its history and habits. Teachers can print lesson plans about
the weather.
By inputting the zip code of the school, students will find out the
weather temperature for that day.
Note: You
can have the children record the “high” temperature for the day. For a more advanced approach, the students
can find the average of the high and low temperatures. “Weather.com” also provides the temperature at
that very moment, so that is a valid temperature choice too.
Procedure: Each day, students will record the
weather temperature in their math notebooks. Teacher will ask students,
What is the difference in the temperature
of today and yesterday?
How did you find your answer? (Answer:
subtraction)
What is the average temperature for today and
yesterday?
How did you find your answer? (Answer: Add
the two temperatures and divide by 2)
Activity: At
the end of each week, students will be responsible for finding the average
temperature of the week. Students can
then graph the temperatures in a bar graph.
Assessment: Informally, Teacher will assess student contributions
to weather discussion. Teacher will
assess student work in math notebooks.
Sample Student Work & Students at work! (Click on the Thumbnail to
enlarge the photo)
For more information, please contact
April Paine at april_paine@hotmail.com |
