Reading with Expression
1. Find the punctuation marks: ? and !
2. For sentences with a question mark (?): Make your voice rise at the end. Stop before next sentence.
3. For sentences with an exclamation point (!): Make your voice rise and show excitement! Stop before next sentence.
"Ever wondered what keeps our streams flowing? Or why rivers don’t run out of water? Or where does the water bubbling out of the ground at natural springs come from? The answer to all these questions actually begins with our sun!"
"Ever wondered what keeps our streams flowing? Or why rivers don’t run out of water? Or where does the water bubbling out of the ground at natural springs come from? The answer to all these questions actually begins with our sun!"
Read this passage:
The sun is like an engine, providing the necessary energy to drive the water cycle. The water cycle is an ongoing process of moving water from the oceans to the land and back.
The sun is like an engine, providing the necessary energy to drive the water cycle. The water cycle is an ongoing process of moving water from the oceans to the land and back.
Read the following out loud:
In Lake Champlain, the water was 1.7 meters deep before the UVM researchers could no longer see the disk. A typical Secchi depth in this part of the lake should be four or five meters, Vaughan said.
Read the following out loud:
In Lake Champlain, the water was 1.7 meters deep before the UVM researchers could no longer see the disk. A typical Secchi depth in this part of the lake should be four or five meters, Vaughan said.
Read the following out loud:
A long-term recovery plan is now under discussion. It would involve reintroducing the winter-run Chinook to stretches of the river above the Shasta Dam. This is an expensive and risky operation given the salmon's already threatened population.
A long-term recovery plan is now under discussion. It would involve reintroducing the winter-run Chinook to stretches of the river above the Shasta Dam. This is an expensive and risky operation given the salmon's already threatened population.
1. Find the punctuation marks: , and .
2. After a comma (,): Take a quick pause.
3. After a period (.): Stop and take a breath.
California is famous for its Chinook salmon. Each spring, they swim up creeks in California’s Central Valley. There, they reach cold waters where they spawn, or lay eggs. Then, they die, completing their life cycle.
California is famous for its Chinook salmon. [stop & breathe] Each spring, [pause] they swim up creeks in California’s Central Valley. [stop & breathe] There, [pause] they reach cold waters where they spawn, [pause] or lay eggs. [stop & breathe] Then, [pause] they die, [pause] completing their life cycle. [stop & breathe]
Explain the importance of evaporation as it relates to living things.
The water cycle begins over our oceans, where the energy from our sun causes huge amounts of water to evaporate every day. When water evaporates, it doesn’t disappear – it becomes water vapor: water in gas form rather than liquid form. Ocean water can evaporate, but salts in the ocean cannot. Because salt cannot evaporate, evaporation separates freshwater out of the ocean. Freshwater is non-ocean water that is usable by land plants and animals, including humans! Evaporation is an important earth process that makes human life possible because it separates the freshwater from the saltwater.
Explain the importance of evaporation as it relates to living things.
Evaporation separates freshwater from saltwater. Living things need freshwater to drink.
Explains how the storm impacted Lake Champlain
Billions of gallons of rainwater, runoff and debris spilled into Lake Champlain after the heavy rain and flooding earlier this month, turning the water into brown muck.
The storm on July 10 and 11 also added large amounts of the nutrient phosphorus to the lake, which can drive cyanobacteria blooms later in the summer, according to Matthew Vaughan, chief scientist for the Lake Champlain Basin Program. But, he added, this month’s storm does not appear to have been as impactful to the lake’s water quality as last summer’s flooding, which deposited about one-half of Lake Champlain’s annual phosphorus target in one week.
Vaughan said this year’s storm was more intense and in a more concentrated area. Much of the heavy rain fell over a shorter period of time and further up in the watershed, which devastated some communities along tributaries but led to lower flows into Lake Champlain. Even still, brown muck rushed out of tributaries, from Otter Creek near Vergennes up to the Lamoille River at Milton.
The storm turned the water into brown muck. It added a lot of phosphorus to the lake, which causes cyanobacteria blooms.
Explain how climate change is affecting the Chinook salmon.
California is famous for its Chinook salmon. Each spring, they swim up creeks in California’s Central Valley. There, they reach cold waters where they spawn, or lay eggs. Then, they die, completing their life cycle. (A life cycle is all the changes that happen to a living thing during its lifetime.)
The salmon have done this for hundreds of years, but this is now changing.
The creek is too warm, an astounding 10 degrees warmer than average in some parts of these spawning grounds. It is the result of the creek's low flow, which speeds up the spread of disease as the water lies still. The creek’s warm temperatures are also the result of the Central Valley's high heat and drought conditions. (A drought is when an area gets less than its normal amount of rain for an extended period of time.)
Example:
Climate change is making the creek too warm. The Chinook salmon need cold water to lay eggs and complete their life cycle.
1. Find the punctuation marks: , and .
2. After a comma (,): Take a quick pause.
3. After a period (.): Stop and take a breath.
The storm on July 10 and 11 also added large amounts of the nutrient phosphorus to the lake, which can drive cyanobacteria blooms later in the summer, according to Matthew Vaughan, chief scientist for the Lake Champlain Basin Program.
The storm on July 10 and 11 also added large amounts of the nutrient phosphorus to the lake, [pause] which can drive cyanobacteria blooms later in the summer, [pause] according to Matthew Vaughan, [pause] chief scientist for the Lake Champlain Basin Program. [stop & breathe]
Explain how precipitation occurs on Earth. You can draw a picture!
As the evaporated water vapor rises up in the atmosphere, it cools and condenses, or starts forming tiny liquid droplets. As larger droplets form, they fall from the clouds as precipitation, such as rain or snow. Most precipitation will fall directly back into the ocean. However, sometimes clouds that form over the ocean will move over a continent and precipitation falls on the land. When rain falls on the land, some of it flows over the surface of the land, which we call runoff.
Precipitation falls from clouds as rain or snow. Most precipitation falls on the ocean. Some falls on land.
Bonus: When it falls on land and flows over the surface, it's called runoff.
Explain what Vaughan and other experts observed on the electric hybrid research vessel.
Last Thursday, Vaughan and other experts took a crew of journalists aboard the University of Vermont’s electric hybrid research vessel, Marcelle Melosira, to explain the flooding’s impact on the lake. As the boat approached the mouth of the Winooski River, the largest tributary into Lake Champlain, the water became murkier from the sediment picked up by the rushing waters.
Researchers on the boat conducted a Secchi water clarity test in the middle of the lake. Scientists use the test to measure water clarity and turbidity by dropping a black and white disk into water and seeing how deep it goes before the disk is no longer visible.
They observed that the water was murky and they could not see far down into the water.
Explains the difference between spring-run salmon and winter-run salmon.
This spring, nearly 16,000 Chinook salmon migrated from the Pacific Ocean to creeks in the Central Valley. (Migration is the movement of a group of animals from one place to another.) Salmon that migrate in the spring are known as spring-run salmon. Of the 16,000 spring-run salmon, about 14,500 died. This was all thanks to the valley's hot, low-flow waterways.
Now, these conditions are threatening the winter migration just as severely. Salmon that migrate in the winter are known as winter-run salmon. While it is still too early to measure the drought's effect on winter migrations, experts worry it could be just as disastrous.
Spring-run salmon migrate in the spring. Winter-run salmon migrate in the winter.
1. Find the punctuation marks: , and .
2. After a comma (,): Take a quick pause.
3. After a period (.): Stop and take a breath.
The storm on July 10 and 11 also added large amounts of the nutrient phosphorus to the lake, which can drive cyanobacteria blooms later in the summer, according to Matthew Vaughan, chief scientist for the Lake Champlain Basin Program. But, he added, this month’s storm does not appear to have been as impactful to the lake’s water quality as last summer’s flooding, which deposited about one-half of Lake Champlain’s annual phosphorus target in one week.
The storm on July 10 and 11 also added large amounts of the nutrient phosphorus to the lake, [pause] which can drive cyanobacteria blooms later in the summer, [pause] according to Matthew Vaughan, [pause] chief scientist for the Lake Champlain Basin Program. [stop & breathe] But, [pause] he added, [pause] this month’s storm does not appear to have been as impactful to the lake’s water quality as last summer’s flooding, [pause] which deposited about one-half of Lake Champlain’s annual phosphorus target in one week. [stop & breathe]
Explain groundwater as it relates to the water cycle.
To infiltrate, in other words, means to seep into the ground. When water infiltrates it fills the tiny gaps in the soils and rocks below our feet! This water is called groundwater! In the water cycle, water may infiltrate into the ground at any point between where it falls on the land as precipitation and when it flows back into the ocean. Like surface water, groundwater also moves or flows, but much more slowly than surface water. Some groundwater bubbles back out of the ground onto the surface in a spring or a gaining stream: a stream that is fed by groundwater rather than runoff. Plants will also take up groundwater through their roots and release it back into the air as water vapor through the tiny pores in their leaves, in a special type of evaporation called transpiration.
Any of the following are correct:
- groundwater moves or flows slowly
- some groundwater bubbles back out of the ground in a spring or a gaining stream
- plants take up groundwater through their roots and release it back into the air as water vapor
How can upstream solutions help slow down the flow of sediments into Lake Champlain?
With climate change creating more severe storms, researchers say upstream solutions can help slow down the flow of sediments into Lake Champlain. On the research vessel, they discussed how green stormwater infrastructure such as wetlands, rain gardens and better infiltration practices can help address the threat.
“When [floodplains are] properly functioning, when they receive floodwaters regularly, when they have vegetation communities out there, they can do a lot to slow floodwaters and capture those nutrients and sediments,” said Rebecca Diehl, a research assistant professor in the Department of Geography and Geosciences at UVM. “If we can take advantage and harness that natural function, we potentially can put a dent in [the] massive amounts of sediments that are moving through our landscape.”
Green stormwater infrastructure such as wetlands, rain gardens, and better infiltration practices can slow down the flow of sediments into the lake.
Explain some of the effects of drought in California.
This past summer, a drought enveloped much of the western United States. The parched-brown landscape has become normal in California. And the rapid shifts from cool to hot, and wet to dry, are driving huge wildfires, mudslides and new demands on water supplies. The drought's second year is also punishing California's rich wildlife, from birds to bears.
The drought has caused wildfires, mudslides, and new demands on water supplies. It is also hurting the wildlife.