EARTH SCIENCE - 3
Warm-up – The Passive: transform active sentences into passive sentences.
1. Poachers have killed more than 500,000 elephants since 1986.
2. Chemical factories are producing large amounts of harmful gases.
3. When did they build the power station?
4. Human activities destroy natural habitats.
5. Hopefully, people will use renewable sources of energy in the future.
6. Scientists were recording changes of temperatures every hour last week.
Vocabulary for Biomes of the world: read about biomes, match them to their names.
1. These areas generally receive less than 25 cm of precipitation per year, the
climate is very hot, dry and windy there, soils are sandy in these areas, there
is almost no green vegetation, and the animals inhabitants living there have
an ability to survive with a minimal amount of water
2. In these areas the amount of moisture is very low (only between 25 and 75
cm of precipitation per year), they have hot summers and mild winters, the
dominant vegetation is grasses, trees are rare.
3. These have a winter-summer change of seasons, during the winter trees
lose their leaves, these areas have evenly distributed precipitation (about 100
cm per year).
4. These areas are located near the Equator, the temperature is quite warm
and constant there, it rains nearly every day, so the plant growth is extremely
rapid, the number of species living there is incredible.
5. These areas have very hot summers and mild winters, they were originally
woodlands, but as a result of human activity the dominant activity is scrub.
the desert
the temperate (deciduous) forest
the tropical rainforest
the taiga (boreal forest)
the tundra
the Mediterranean scrub
the savanna(h)
Put the biomes in the right order; start from
the Equator.
6. These areas lack trees, they have a permanently frozen soil layer
(permafrost), the amount of precipitation is very small (only 25 cm per year),
during the short summer only very small plants and lichens can grow and
these are food for the few mammal visitors like caribou, reindeer or arctic
hare.
Polar ice caps
the Equator
7. These areas are covered by coniferous forests (spruces, larches and firs
are the most common), the winters are very long and harsh, many of the
animal inhabitants come only for summers.
fill in the table, describe characteristic features of each biome (use the words below).
Precipitation
Climate
the tropical rainforest
the tundra
the temperate deciduous forest
the savannah
the Mediterranean scrub
the desert
Precipitation: (very, extremely) high, average, (very, extremely) low
Climate: (very, extremely) hot, warm, mild, cold
(very, extremely) wet, dry
wet season, dry season, four seasons (spring, summer…)
Vegetation: coniferous / deciduous trees, the rainforest, scrub, grasses…
Biological diversity: (very, extremely) high, average, (very, extremely) low
Dominant vegetation + animal
species
Vocabulary – the Water Cycle: fill in the blanks with the words from the box
soil
seawater
clouds
water vapour
groundwater
condensation
the sun
precipitation
surface
rivers
land
_____________
(rain)water, plants
temperature
fill in the table, choose from the list of verbs, then describe the water cycle.
rise
condense
flow
cool
form
transpire
precipitate
radiate
run off (the surface)
absorb
evaporate
heat/warm
fall down
move (to)
leak /seep
(into)
Water cycle vocabulary:
nouns
verbs
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