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Earth Science for Kids

Weather Forecasting

We all want to know what the weather is going to be like. It helps us to plan out our days. We want to know how warm to dress, if we should bring an umbrella, or if it will be a good day for a picnic. Although it may sometimes seem like weather forecasters are just guessing, there is a lot of science that goes into predicting the weather.

Meteorology

Meteorology is the study of the Earth's atmosphere. Scientists who study the atmosphere are called meteorologists. By studying the Earth's atmosphere, meteorologists are able to predict what the weather will be. However, there are a lot of variables that goes into predicting the weather. For this reason, the predictions are not 100% accurate.

Meteorologists measure and study many aspects of the Earth's atmosphere. In order to forecast the weather, they study high and low pressure systems and the boundaries between them called weather fronts. We describe these in more detail below.

Highs and Lows

Knowing areas of high and low air pressure is important to predicting the weather because differences in air pressure causes wind to form.

High pressure system - A high pressure system generally means good weather because it attracts cool and dry air. On a weather map a high pressure system is shown by a blue H.

Low pressure system - A low pressure system generally means rainy or cloudy weather. This is because low pressure systems generally attract warm and moist air. On a weather map a low pressure system is shown by a red L.

Weather Fronts

The boundary between high and low pressure systems is called a weather front. It is where these two different masses of air meet that most storms form.


Weather front symbols
1. cold front
2. warm front
3. stationary front
4. occluded front
5. dry line

Meteorological Technology

A lot of technology goes into measuring and predicting the weather. Some of the tools meteorologists use are described below.
Interesting Facts about Weather Forecasting Activities

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Science >> Earth Science for Kids


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