Biomes are geographical regions identified by their dominant plants, their animals, and a particular climate.
A desert is a biome that most people think of as hot and arid (extremely dry), such as the one shown in the photo.
Notice the absence of plants in the photo. This is due to the heat and lack of water in the region shown. Camels are the best mode of transportation in an arid desert because they can survive for days or even months without water, it depends on the temperature. Another adaptive physical feature of desert camels is the shape and size of their feet, which allows them to walk on the sand instead of sinking into it.
Desert Precipitation
Deserts can be either hot or cold. But it is the amount of precipitation (rain, ice, snow) that determines whether a region is a desert. Deserts have an average rainfall of less than 10 inches (25 cm) per year. Another factor that describes a desert is its high annual evaporation rate, which is a measure of how much moisture evaporates from the surface each year. In deserts the annual evaporation rate is higher than the annual amount of rainfall.
- The Dry Valleys in Antarctica is an area which has had no precipitation reach the ground ever in recorded history. This is the driest place on Earth.
- About thirteen inches of snow equals one inch of rain, but this ratio varies depending on how moist the snow is. It could take fifty inches of very dry powdery snow to equal one inch of rain.
- Evaporation of water occurs below the boiling point of water, which is 2120F (1000C). is the physical change of liquid water to gas.
Hot Deserts
Temperatures in hot deserts can be as high as 125 0 F (520 C) with the record high being 138 0F (57.8 0C) in Death Valley, California.
Cold deserts
Cold deserts have daytime temperatures that often are below freezing for part of the year and their main form of precipitation is snow. Dry Valleys, Antarctica is a cold desert as is the Great Basin desert, which is the largest desert in the United States.
I suggest that geography be part of your science study. In fact, geography is the field of science devoted to the study of the lands, the features, and the inhabitants of Earth.
- Kids can discover the location of hot and cold deserts around the world on a globe or world map.
Teaching Tips:
Multi-sensory experiences help children to remember and retain information more effectively. This is because using multiple senses provides more cognitive connections and associations with concept being studied. In other words, if you see it, hear it, smell it, touch it, and taste it, you have five senses to remind you of the concept. A smell can trigger certain memories. I saw a movie today in which kids walked into an old dusty mansion and said, “It smells like grandma’s house.” I think I’ll dust and light scented candles before my family comes to visit.
A friend teaches 5th grade science and has all her students keep a science notebook. They use a bound notebook. Lat year, several of her students agreed to send their notebooks to me at the end of the school year. The content was not a cloned copy of the teacher’s notes, instead, it was a mixture of facts from the teacher and kid ideas and thoughts. I suggest that you try this.
Research: What physical and behavior survival adaptations do desert plants and animals have? What are the four basic kinds of deserts?
I think
my brain is leaking information or at least storing away where I cannot find it. One would thing that since I wrote a book about biomes, “Science Around the World” that I’d know all about them. I do, its just that I cannot remember where I stored it in my brain. I had zippy recall on the information for some time after I wrote the book.
Truthfully, I am surprised at the amount of information I collected and shared in this book.
My books are much like my own personal journal. At one time, I traveled a lot visiting schools, libraries etc…. during my travels I designed activities and experiments while waiting at airports or any down time I had. When I look at the diagrams, it brings back memories when I sketched them. Another example of the benefits of multi-sensory experiences.
The book can be purchased at Amazon.
