Thursday, December 18, 2008

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Today's schedule is B-A-Lunch-D-C.

B- Earth and Space Science 11 - Today we will continue our work on the Major Snowfall and Operation Icestorm activities, along with the atmosphere worksheet 3 and questions from the text we started yesterday. Today, we'll begin the epically bad movie The Day After Tomorrow. I do not have enough room to explain all of the errors in meteorology that the movie depicts. Suffice it to say that I pretty much ruined the movie for everyone in the theater when I saw it (groans, laughs, and sniffs of derision!) That being said the graphics are cool and the hail storm in Tokyo made me giggle with delight. The following are some web sites that help you understand why the science is bad!
Weather Underground: The Day After Tomorrow
Intuitor.com: The Day After Tomorrow
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution: The Day After Tomorrow
MSNBC: The Day After Tomorrow
National Snow and Ice Data Center
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research: The Day After Tomorrow
USA Today: The Day After Tomorrow
You could even watch the South Park parody Two Days Before The Day After Tomorrow
we'll finish the movie tomorrow.

A - Law 12 - Today we'll continue working on our civil law case study project. Take a look at the section on Trespass to Person and Property in Intentional Torts (chapter 12 - pages 321-327) in the All About Law textbook. There are defenses to trespass (consent, self-defense, defense of a third party, defense of property, legal authority, and necessity) that you should take a look at as well (pages 328-3131).

D - Geography 12 - Today we will finish working on the Okanagan Valley topographic map that we started yesterday. Don't forget you will need to work on questions 1 a-c, 2 i, ii & c, 3 a & b, 5 a, b, c, & d, 8, 9 a, b, c, and 11. Look at yesterday's blog entry for help with interpreting topographic maps and for an on-line version of the Okanagan Valley topographic map.

When we're done, we will begin watching Twister; one of the greatest yet dumbest disaster movies of the 1990's. Your job is to identify as many errors in meteorology as possible AND you'll need to figure out which character is MOST like Mr. Young.

Some errors are easy - NO! It is not possible to survive an EF5 tornado strike above ground tethered to drainage pipes. Some are more subtle - the Fujita scale was introduced in 1971 and in the 1969 flashback scene (at the beginning of the film) the weather reporter on the television (portrayed by Oklahoma City KWTV 9 meteorologist Gary England) said an F5 tornado was about to strike...two years before the scale was introduced by Dr. Ted Fujita!

Now as to characters...as I said above there are bits of Mr. Young in most of the characters in the movie your mission (should you choose to accept it) is to figure out who Mr. Young is most like. The mission is not impossible so is it Dr. Jo Harding? Bill Harding? Dustin 'Dusty' Davis? Robert 'Rabbit' Nurick? Jason 'Preacher' Rowe? No, Mr. Young is not like Dr. Melissa Reeves or Dr. Jonas Miller so let's get that over with now :) Let's have some fun with the movie and we'll finish it tomorrow.

C - Introduction to Law 9/10 - Today we will finish up our Actus Reus / Mens Rea poster activity from yesterday and you'll present your answers to the class in your groups. After you'll get the handout on criminal procedures (before the trial). You will need to work on the following questions on the handout "Focus on Reading" #'s 3, 24, 25, 26, 29, 30, and 31 "Resolving Cases"#'s 12 & 28 and "Applying Your Knowledge" #27. We will continue this tomorrow and then we'll end the week with a Law & Order Criminal Intent episode.

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