Lesson video

Hi, everyone.

My name is Miss Dhillon.

And last lesson, we were exploring the question, why does it rain? Can you name the three types of rainfall that we discussed last lesson? Have a few seconds to think.

Call it out when you're ready.

Good, you should have said convectional, frontal, and orographic rainfall.

Three very tricky words, so well done for remembering them.

The question we will be exploring in today's lesson is, why does the UK have wild weather? Let's start by looking at the structure of today's lesson.

In today's lesson, we will start with star words, then we will recap our knowledge of the world map, before looking more closely at the UK and why it has wild weather, and finally, we will be doing this by studying different air masses.

In this lesson, you will need a piece of paper, a pen, and your brain as you will be doing a lot of new learning in today's lesson.

On the screen, you can see the star words for today's lesson.

I will be explaining these star words in more detail throughout the lesson.

Let's begin by saying them out loud using my turn your turn.

Air mass.

Weather.

Source.

Maritime.

Continental.

Polar.

Arctic.

Tropical.

Well done.

We are going to start this lesson by checking our understanding of the world map.

I would like you to label one ocean and two continents on the world map.

There are three green boxes.

Can you match up either Atlantic Ocean, Europe, or Africa with the correct missing box? Pause the video now to complete this task.

You should now have finished this task.

Let's look at the answers.

Here are the correct answers.

Did you get all three correct? Well done if you did.

This knowledge will help us understand where the air masses, what we are learning about in today's lesson, where they come from.

So it's really helpful knowledge for today's lesson.

On the screen, you can see another map.

In the red circle, you can see the United Kingdom.

Can you point to where you think the Arctic Ocean is? The clue is in Arctic.

Point at the screen now for me.

If you pointed near the top of the map, then you are correct.

The Arctic Ocean is located mostly in the Arctic north polar region.

So that's roughly where you should have said the Arctic Ocean is.

Now let's look more closely at the UK.

The UK has wild weather.

Whilst it is usually quite mild, the weather can change very, very quickly.

This means that people living in the UK or visiting the UK must be prepared for all types of weather.

The UK has this changeable weather because of where it is located.

Look at the map on the left-hand side.

The UK's weather is strongly influenced by the sea that surrounds the British Isles, both Britain and Ireland.

The UK's weather is also affected by the different air masses, or bodies of air, which is something we're going to look at in more depth in today's lesson.

An air mass is an area of air with particular characteristics.

Depending on the source, as in where the air mass comes from, can help us understand the characteristics of that particular air mass.

So looking at this table, we can see that if an air mass travels over land, then it will bring with it very dry weather.

If an air mass travels over the oceans, it will bring with it very wet weather.

If an air mass travels over the tropics, it will bring with it very warm weather.

And finally, if it travels over the Arctic, it will bring very cold weather.

This is why when we name air masses, we might use maritime to describe air masses that travel over the ocean, and we use continental to describe air masses that travel over land.

So this helps us understand the name of the air masses.

Maritime means it travels over water and continental means it travels over land.

I would now like you to pause the video to complete the task on the screen.

Fill in the missing gaps in the table.

Here are the answers.

Did you remember those correctly? Great recall, give me a high five.

What a great start to the lesson today.

The UK has changeable weather because more than one air mass can be affecting the UK at any one time.

We are going to be looking at five main air masses that affect the UK.

They are polar maritime, Arctic maritime, polar continental, tropical continental, and tropical maritime.

Notice that these air masses end in maritime or in continental.

Remember if it's maritime, that it means it's travelled over the ocean and therefore it will bring with it wet weather.

The other thing to remember is that if it has continental in the name of the air mass, then this means it travels over land and this means it brings very dry weather.

Well done, so over the ocean is wet weather and over land is dry weather.

Let's now have a look at these five air masses affecting the UK in a little bit more depth.

The name of the air masses holds clues as to where they originated and hence the weather they will bring to the UK.

Polar maritime comes from the North Atlantic Ocean and is cold and wet.

Polar gives you the clue that it is going to be cold and maritime we know travels over the ocean and therefore brings wet weather.

The next air mass that affects the UK is the Arctic maritime.

This comes from the Arctic Ocean and is very cold and sometimes wet.

This is because it travels over the water.

And Arctic gives you a clue that it's going to be very, very cold.

The next air mass that affects the UK is called the polar continental, which comes from Northern Europe.

You can use the compass to help you remember where North is on the compass.

The word polar gives us a clue that the weather is going to be cold.

And as it is continental, it travels over land, good.

It travels over land and therefore it will bring very dry weather.

Good work, team.

It seems like you're getting the hang of this already.

Now let's look at the next air mass that affects the UK.

This is called the tropical continental, and this comes from Southern Europe and North Africa.

Again, you can use the compass to help you see what we mean by Southern.

As the word name is made up of tropical continental, tropical gives us a clue that it brings very warm weather and continental means it travels over land so it brings very warm and very dry weather.

Finally, the last main air mass affecting the UK comes from the Atlantic Ocean and it is called the tropical maritime.

The word tropical gives us a clue that it brings very warm weather and maritime tells us that it travels over the ocean and therefore brings wet weather.

So together, it brings, good, it brings warm, but wet weather.

Good job, team.

So you might have noticed that air masses coming from the left-hand side of the UK, or we can say that as the West, are normally ending with the word maritime, which means it travels over the ocean.

And then on the East side where you can see the polar continental and tropical continental, they both travel over land, and that's why it brings dry weather from the East.

Okay, team, so now it's time for us to play a little memory game.

I'm going to explain how this game works.

On the screen, you can see the table that will help you remember the characteristics of the different air masses.

You will see the name of the air mass that affects the UK.

You will need to say what kind of weather this air mass brings to the UK.

For example, the first example is on the screen.

Arctic maritime.

I know that Arctic brings very cold weather and maritime brings very wet weather.

So the answer will be that the Arctic maritime brings both cold and wet weather.

Now it's your turn.

Are you ready? Okay, first question.

What weather does this air mass bring to the UK? Did you say warm and wet? Well done, you've made a good start to this memory game.

On to the next one.

Polar continental.

Did you say cold and dry? Well done if you did.

Next one is polar maritime.

Did you say cold and wet? Good job.

I can see that you're really trying hard to interpret the table, well done.

Next one is tropical continental.

You should have said warm and dry.

Well done if you got that correct.

You should now be feeling a little bit more confident with describing the characteristics of the different air masses.

Now it's time for you to do a bit more practise.

For this task, I would like you to match up the keywords in the black box on the right-hand side to the correct position on the map.

Where it says times two next to the keyword, this means that the word comes up twice.

For example, tropical needs to be used twice in two different places.

Pause the video now to complete the task.

Here are the answers.

They have been underlined so it's easier for you to see them.

I would like you to take a minute or two to check and mark your work.

How did you do? Did you get most of these correct? Well done if you did.

I know you're working really hard to try and remember all five air masses and where they come from.

So keep up the good work.

Now that we have discussed the five different air masses, it is now time for you to tell me which one is your favourite air mass and why.

For example, for me personally, my favourite air mass is tropical continental, which comes from Southern Europe and North Africa.

This is because it brings my favourite type of weather, which is warm and dry.

Now it's your turn to write down your answer.

Pause the video to complete the task on the screen.

It is now time for you to complete your end of lesson quiz.

Thank you so much for your effort in today's lesson, and I really hope you enjoy the rest of the day.

And I can't wait to see you again in lesson five, where we will be exploring the question, what is the reason for the seasons? Bye everyone.